Gift to Kim Jong Il from Italian delegation
Pyongyang, March 3 (KCNA) -- General Secretary Kim Jong Il received a gift from the visiting delegation of parliamentarians from the Democratic Union for the Republic of Italy.
The gift was handed to an official concerned by head of the delegation Guido Folloni, member of the senate.
Greetings to Bulgarian President
Pyongyang, March 3 (KCNA) -- General Secretary Kim Jong Il today sent a wreath to the bier of Ri Ji Chan, member of the Central Committee of the Worker's Party of Korea, expressing deep condolence over his death.
He died on Thursday at the age of 84. He greatly contributed to developing the country's power industry, holding a responsible post in its domain for a long period.
Kim Jong Il sends wreath to bier of Ri Ji Chan
Pyongyang, March 3 (KCNA) -- Kim Yong Nam, President of the presidium of the DPRK Supreme People's Assembly, today sent a message of greetings to Peter Stoyanov, President of the Republic of Bulgaria, on the occasion of its National Day.
The message expressed the belief that the relations between the two countries would develop on good terms and wished the Bulgarian President and people success in their work for the prosperity of the country.
Premier Hong Song Nam and Foreign Minister Paek Nam Sun sent messages of greetings separately to their Bulgarian counterparts.
Kim Yong Nam meets Italian parliamentary delegation
Pyongyang, March 3 (KCNA) -- Kim Yong Nam, President of the presidium of the DPRK Supreme People's Assembly, met and conversed with the delegation of parliamentarians from the Democratic Union for the Republic of Italy led by Guido Folloni, member of the senate, at the Mansudae Assembly Hall today.
Present there was Ji Jae Ryong, vice department director of the C.C., the Worker's Party of Korea who is also deputy to the SPA.
Agreement signed between governments of DPRK and Egypt
Pyongyang, March 3 (KCNA) -- An agreement on prevention of double taxation on income and property and tax evasion between the governments of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea and the Arab republic of Egypt was signed at the Mansudae Assembly Hall on March 2.
The agreement was inked by vice-Minister of Finance Kim Wan Su and Egyptian ambassador to the DPRK Mahmoud Mohamed Farag Zain.
"Reserve forces" training in S. Korea
Pyongyang, March 3 (KCNA) -- The South Korean rulers reportedly announced that they would carry out "reserve forces" training involving 2,740,000 people from March 2 to December 2 this year.
The rulers decided to give them all training except "mobilization" training not only at their units but in all parts of South Korea in an effort to embroil them in the war rehearsal.
The ruling quarters are now calling out more people to "reserve forces" training, while reinforcing armed forces and staging war exercises one after another to aggravate tensions.
Killing of S. Korean woman condemned
Pyongyang, March 3 (KCNA) -- Women in the North Korea are condemning GI's killing of a South Korean woman.
Speakers at the rallies held at the Pyongyang telephone office and on the Ryuso co-op farm in Rakrang district, Pyongyang, charged that the U.S. murderous troops went on rampage of rape and killing against a large number of women, young and old, in South Korea.
Yankees' slaughter of innocent people in South Korea is entirely attributable to the despicable flunkeyist treacheries of the South Korean rulers, who defended the murderers instead of resolutely punishing them, the speakers said.
They called on all the South Korean women and other people to come out in a nationwide struggle against the U.S. and the South Korean rulers to sweep away the aggressors and their stooges and make them pay for the blood of the victims.
Leadership of party of working class
Pyongyang, March 3 (KCNA) -- Rodong Sinmun today carries a signed article explaining the proposition of General Secretary Kim Jong Il that the leadership provided by a working class party is a life line in accomplishing the cause of socialism.
He, on the basis of the immortal Juche idea, set out a famous formulation that the party's leadership is a life line in accomplishing the cause of socialism, thus giving a successful solution to the problem of the leadership of a working-class party in carrying out the cause, the article says, and goes on:
The leadership of a working-class party is vital to accomplishing the cause of socialism because it provides a sure guarantee for strengthening the driving force to carry out the cause of socialism and increasing its role and a fundamental condition for advancing this cause, guided by a correct strategy and tactics.
The politico-ideological might, voluntary enthusiasm and creative initiative of the popular masses, the strong driving force in socialist construction, originate from the party's leadership intended to awaken the masses to accept the cause of socialism as their own.
A revolutionary party of the working class is headquarters of the revolution which puts forward a correct strategy and tactics for socialist construction and organizes and leads a struggle for carry them out.
The party advances a line and policy that reflect the desire of the popular masses and actual conditions in each period and at every stage of the revolution and skillfully organizes the popular masses to implement them.
The leadership of a working-class party is vital to accomplishing the cause of socialism also because this is a prerequisite to consistently adhering to a revolutionary principle and thoroughly implementing it in the whole course of carrying out the cause of socialism.
The fundamental principle of socialism can be firmly adhered to only under the leadership of a revolutionary working-class party.
This was clearly proved by what happened in the former soviet union and east European countries. Socialism can advance victoriously only under the leadership of a working-class party, concludes the article.
Friendly gathering with Italian guests
Pyongyang, March 3 (KCNA) -- A friendly gathering with Antonio Loche, secretary general of the Italy-Democratic People's Republic of Korea Association for Friendship and Cooperation, and his party took place in Pyongyang on Thursday.
Present there were the vice-chairman and members of the Korea-Italy Friendship Association.
The participants exchanged opinions about the need to further strengthen activities of the associations in order to develop the friendly relations between the two peoples.
An art performance was given by schoolchildren at the gathering.
Anti-U.S., anti-Japanese rallies and demonstrations
Pyongyang, March 3 (KCNA) -- Big anti-U.S., anti-Japanese rallies and demonstrations were staged in major cities of South Korea, including Seoul, on March 1, according to a foreign news report.
Members of the south headquarters of the National Alliance for the Country's Reunification (Pomminryon), the South Korean Federation of University Student Councils and other organizations staged a demonstration in Seoul demanding the withdrawal of the U.S. troops and a thorough probe into GIs' mass killings of civilians during the Korean War.
The south headquarters of the Pomminryon in a statement issued before the demonstration fully supported the proposal of the political parties and organizations in the North Korea to set up "a nationwide ad hoc committee for probing the truth behind GIs' massacres" and demanded the abolition of the "security law" and the release of prisoners of conscience.
Saying that the massacre committed by GIs in Rogun-ri is all but the tip of iceberg of their brutal mass killings during the Korean War, the organizations called on the north and the south to unite and conduct a joint probe into the truth about all atrocities.
U.S. occupation of S. Korea denounced
Pyongyang, March 3 (KCNA) -- The history of the U.S. aggression forces' occupation of South Korea is a bloody history of plunder and human right violations as well as massacres of people calling for independence, democracy and reunification, says Rodong Sinmun today.
In a signed article the paper stresses that the U.S. aggression forces, who occupied South Korea after the liberation of Korea on August 15, 1945, were by no means "liberator."
Citing detailed facts to disclose the shocking murderous atrocities committed by them during their occupation of over half a century, the paper says:
Their atrocities in South Korea, which have been disclosed until now after the august 15 liberation, total 270,000 cases at least. And hundreds of thousands of inhabitants have been killed or wounded by the GIs since the cease-fire of the Korean war.
Immeasurable are pain, misfortune and disasters the Korean nation has suffered from the U.S. aggression forces' occupation of South Korea, the paper says, contending that their military occupation should be allowed no longer.
It further says:
People from all walks of life in South Korea should activate the struggle for independence against the U.S., hardening their will to put a period to the occupation of South Korea by the U.S. who are a root cause of their misfortunes and pain.
The U.S. is a butcher, ferocious dominator and plunderer, and the root cause of all evils. They brutally kill South Korean people and act like the master of South Korea, taking hold on its politics, economy, military and culture, threatening the existence of the Korean nation.
The struggle for independence against the U.S. is a way out for the South Korean people and a way of defending the nation's security.
Senior party and state officials plant trees
Pyongyang, March 3 (KCNA) -- Working people and school youth and children of the DPRK have turned out in the spring tree-planting drive around March 2, the day of tree-planting.
Meetings were held in different parts of the country on Thursday to conduct the drive on a nationwide scale.
Kim Yong Nam, Hong Song Nam, Kye Ung Thae, Han Song Ryong and other senior party and state officials were present at the meetings which took place at the arboretum of the Kumsusan Memorial Palace and the construction site for the monument to the three-point charter of national reunification in Pyongyang and in Chongsan-ri and Kochang-ri, Nampho.
The meetings stressed the need for all the working people and school youth and children to participate in the tree-planting drive so as to make the mountains of the country covered with forests of economic value, forests of oil-bearing trees and firewood forests and turn streets and villages into a garden and park.
They also urged them to turn out as one in the drive this year and thus greatly contribute to increasing the nation's forestry resources and renewing the looks of land.
After the meetings those senior officials, together with working people and school youth and children, planted trees of various species with sincerity.
Literature congratulating Kim Jong Il on his birthday scattered
Pyongyang, March 3 (KCNA) -- Copies of literature congratulating General Secretary Kim Jong Il on his 58th birthday were scattered in and around Taejon on Feb. 16, the Seoul-based radio Voice of National Salvation quoted the south Chungchong provincial committee of the National Democratic Front of South Korea as saying.
The literature was made in the name of the February 16 fellowship society. Written on its front were the letters "warm congratulations to leader Kim Jong Il, destiny of the nation, on his birthday." Depicted there was a floral basket decorated with 58 Kimjongilias. Also written on its back were the letters "February 16 is an auspicious day, the 58th birthday of the great leader Kim Jong Il who is sun of our nation and humankind. Let all of us sincerely wish leader Kim Jong Il long life in good health" against the background of the birthplace at the secret camp on Mt. Paektu and Jong Il Peak.
That day copies of postcard congratulating Kim Jong Il on his birthday which were made in the name of the Sobaeksu Society were distributed to families in Seoul.
GIs' mass killings denounced
Pyongyang, March 3 (KCNA) -- Truths about GIs' brutal massacres of peaceable civilians during the Korean War (June 25, 1950-july 27, 1953) is being disclosed one after another, lashing the world public into fury.
The Korean Democratic Lawyers Association and the Korean National Peace Committee in a joint appeal denounced the U.S. forces for their crimes and called for setting up an international tribunal to punish those responsible for war crimes and voicing positive support to the Korean people in their struggle to force the U.S. government to make an apology and compensation for them.
The governments, political parties, social organizations and peace-loving people of many countries and international organizations that value justice and peace are positively responding to this joint appeal.
The russian newspaper patriot said that the atrocities committed by the U.S. forces during the Korean War are putting the Hitler clique into the shade in brutality and cruelty.
The Asian Regional Institute of the Juche Idea in its statement called upon progressive humankind and the world conscience that love peace and respect human rights to brand unheard-of mass killings committed by the U.S. forces during the Korean War as crimes against humanity and strongly condemn them.
Ehiya Zakaria Hairla, general secretary of the Arab Art, Culture and Information Association of Egypt, said in his statement that massacres of peaceable civilians in the wartime are unpardonable and indelible crimes against humanity.
The Austrian Committee for Supporting Korea's Reunification and the Society for the Promotion of the Relations between Austria and the DPRK in a joint statement demanded that an international historians' fact-finding group be organized to investigate and expose GIs' mass killings.
8 political parties and organizations of Peru in a joint statement demanded the U.S. apologize and compensate for these monstrous crimes and called upon the international community that value justice and conscience to condemn U.S. crimes against humanity.
Immortal exploits in promulgating agrarian reform law
Pyongyang, March 3 (KCNA) -- March 5 is the 54th anniversary of the proclamation of the law on agrarian reform in Korea.
On the occasion of the day the agricultural working people across the country look back with deep emotion on the immortal exploits of the great leader President Kim Il Sung who devoted himself to the realization of agrarian reform.
Soon after the liberation of Korea in August, 1945, peasants accounted for over 80 percent of the population in Korea, and landlords making up no more than 4 percent of all farm families held 58.2 percent of cultivated land.
The centuries-old desire of the peasants was to do farm work by themselves to their heart's content in their own land.
The President, considerate of their desire, put forward the solution of agrarian problem as an urgent one and wisely led this work.
He went to various rural areas to sit together with peasants and listen to their ardent desire and will and acquainted himself with the specific conditions for the agrarian reform, walking with them on roads among fields.
And he put forward the slogan "land to the tillers " and enforced the agrarian reform on the principle of confiscation without compensation and distribution without charge.
The "law on agrarian reform in North Korea" was promulgated on March 5, Juche 35 (1946).
This is a historic declaration heralding the birth of a master of new Korea, a new master of the land.
With the agrarian reform successfully realised, the cherished desire of peasants was brought into reality.
To convey long the immortal exploits made by the President in promulgating the law on agrarian reform to posterity, March 5 is significantly commemorated every year as the Day of Agricultural Workers in Korea.
Massacres by U.S. troops condemned abroad
Pyongyang, March 3 (KCNA) -- Statements condemning the U.S. troops' mass killings of civilians during the last Korean War were issued by the Ugandan National Association of Students, the Austrian Committee for Supporting Korea's Reunification, the Society for the Promotion of the Relations between Austria and the DPRK, chairman of the National Restoration Party of Peru Eleassar Gutara Mmarabi and chairman of the People's Front of India B. Mohan.
The statements said that the massacres committed by the U.S. troops during the Korean War, which were outright breach of the international treaties and wartime regulations, should be put under fire.
The statements emphasized that the U.S. should lend an ear to the just voices of the world, punish the war criminals and apologize and compensate at an early date.
Chongryon issues appeal
Pyongyang, March 3 (KCNA) -- The central standing committee of the General Association of Korean Residents in Japan (Chongryon) on Mar. 1 released an appeal to Koreans in Japan as regards "a movement of Koreans in Japan for brilliantly greeting the 45th anniversary of the formation of Chongryon through excellent living service and mutual help" which is to be conducted from March 1, according to Joson Sinbo published in Japan.
This is a historic year for the new generation to pave the way for carrying forward Chongryon and patriotic exploits organized and performed by the first generation all their life following the President Kim Il Sung and strengthening and developing them in conformity with the changed situation under the guidance of General Secretary Kim Jong Il, the appeal stressed.
It called for creating a new history of the patriotic movement following the idea and leadership of Kim Jong Il with him as the mental pillar.
Touching upon the tasks to be carried out by branches, organizations and enterprises under Chongryon and for national education, the appeal called upon all the Koreans in Japan to conduct a vigorous movement with the great national pride and honor of holding Kim Jong Il in high esteem and full of firm confidence and optimism.