Lead
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un held photo sessions on Friday with participants in a women's association meeting and with exemplary officers and soldiers from a construction and engineering military unit, the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported Saturday, as carried by Yonhap News Agency. The meetings were seen as part of efforts to rally loyalty and solidify internal unity, according to the report.
The photo session with members of the Eighth Congress of the Socialist Women's Union of Korea took place days after the congress convened in Pyongyang. The meeting with the construction unit soldiers was held separately, and the specific unit was not identified by KCNA.
Coverage Comparison
Yonhap News Agency provided two separate reports on the events. The first, published July 15, covered the Eighth Congress of the Socialist Women's Union of Korea (SWUK), which took place in Pyongyang on Monday and Tuesday of that week. The second, published July 18, detailed Kim Jong-un's subsequent photo sessions with congress participants and construction unit soldiers.
Both reports rely exclusively on information from the Korean Central News Agency, North Korea's official state media. The reports do not include independent verification or commentary from external sources.
Key Claims
According to KCNA, when Kim Jong-un arrived at the photo session venue, "all the participants broke into stormy cheers of 'Hurrah!' looking up to the tender-hearted father who put forward our women before the era and has shown them great trust and love."
Kim was quoted as saying it is his "highest pride and our state's great strength to have the women's organization full of the noble spirit of firmly trusting and following our Party only and passionately loving and defending socialism, a powerful group of women patriots without a parallel in their active role and fighting efficiency."
During his visit to the construction unit, Kim "extended warm militant encouragement to the service personnel who are displaying the unconditional execution spirit and implacable power of execution in carrying out our party's order," according to KCNA. He expressed belief that the unit's officers and soldiers would "continue making remarkable achievements, the desires of the country and the people, in the vanguard of construction revolution for building structures of eternal value this year, too."
The congress itself, which lasted from July 13-14, was the first in five years. According to Yonhap's report, the Socialist Women's Union of Korea is one of the four largest labor organizations under the guidance of the ruling Workers' Party of Korea (WPK) and is mainly aimed at instilling party ideology in the people.
In a congratulatory message read at the congress, the WPK central committee urged the women's union to "safeguard" socialist ideology and culture against "reactionary" capitalism. The message stated that members "should thoroughly reject reactionary capitalist ideology and lifestyles and wage a staunch struggle to defend our socialist ideology and culture," emphasizing patriotic, class and moral education as key tasks.
The party also highlighted the role of workers' groups, including the SWUK, in leading the regime's drive for transformation for prosperity.
The meeting was attended by Jo Yong-won, secretary of the party's central committee, along with other party secretaries Jong Kyong-thaek and Ju Chang-il. Kim Jong-un was not present at the congress itself.