Gifts to Kim Jong Il

    Pyongyang, April 19 (KCNA) -- Leader Kim Jong Il received gifts from the visiting delegations and delegates of Juche idea study organizations from various countries on the occasion of the 90th birth anniversary of President Kim Il Sung. Among them were the president of the council of the European Society for the Study of the Juche Idea and his party, the secretary general of the Latin American Institute of the Juche Idea and her party, the secretary general of the African Regional Committee for the Study of the Juche Idea, the delegation of the Mongolia-Paektusan Association, the vice-chairman of the Ukrainian Society for the Study of the Juche Idea who is a delegate of the Ukrainian organizations for the study of the Juche idea, the delegation of the Finland organizations for the study of the Juche idea, an Indonesian delegate for the study of the Juche idea, the delegation of the Sri Lankan organizations for the study of the Juche idea, the delegation of the national liaison council of Japan societies for the study of works of Kim Jong Il, the delegation of the Nepalese organizations for the study of the Juche idea and the chief of the Danish group for the study of the works of Kim Jong Il who is a delegate of the Danish organizations for the study of the Juche idea.
    Kim Jong Il also received gifts in the joint name of the Japanese society for the study of Kimilsungism and the national liaison council of Japan societies for the study of the Juche idea, and the coordinating center for social development of Thailand and the national research council of Thailand.
    The gifts were handed to an official concerned by the heads of the delegations and delegates of the organizations for the study of the Juche idea.

Talks held between delegations of WPK and Tajik Communist Party

    Pyongyang, April 19 (KCNA) -- Talks between the delegations of the Workers' Party of Korea and the Tajik Communist Party were held here yesterday. At the talks, both sides informed each other of the activities of their parties and exchanged views on developing the friendly relations between the two parties and a series of matters of mutual concern.
    Present at the talks were Kim Ki Nam, secretary of the Central Committee of the WPK, and officials concerned and the members of the delegation of the Tajik Communist Party led by its chairman Shodi Shabdolov.
    The talks proceeded in a friendly atmosphere.

Friendly meeting with delegation of Indonesian women's congress

    Pyongyang, April 19 (KCNA) -- A friendly meeting with the members of the delegation of the Indonesian women's congress was held on April 18. Present on invitation were the members of the visiting delegation of the congress headed by its president Inne E. A. Soekaryo.
    Chairwoman Pak Sun Hui and vice-chairwoman Choe Chang Suk of the central committee of the Korean Democratic Women's Union and officials of the union were on hand.
    The participants talked with each other about the activities of the two women's organizations and the successes and experience made in the past, deepening the friendly feelings.

Talks held between delegations of WPK and Syrian political party

    Pyongyang, April 19 (KCNA) -- Talks between the delegations of the Workers' Party of Korea and Syria's Baath Arab Socialist Party and national progressive front were held in Pyongyang yesterday. At the talks both sides informed each other of the activities of their parties and exchanged views on developing the friendly relations between the two parties and a series of matters of mutual concern.
    Present there were Choe Thae Bok, alternate member of the political bureau and secretary of the Central Committee of the WPK, Pak Kyong Son, vice department director of the C.C., the WPK, and other officials concerned, the members of the delegation of Syria's Baath Arab Socialist Party and national progressive front led by Muhammad Zouher Mashariqa, member of the national and regional leadership of the Arab Socialist Baath Party and vice-president of Syria, and Haissam Saad, charge d'affaires ad interim of the Syrian embassy here.
    The talks proceeded in a friendly atmosphere.

Japan's nuclear weaponization under fire

    Pyongyang, April 19 (KCNA) -- Leader of the Liberal Party of Japan Ichiro Ozawa in a recent lecture let loose a spate of outbursts that "Japan is capable of producing thousands of nuclear warheads if it has a will." In this regard Rodong Sinmun today in a signed commentary says:
    His bellicose outbursts are a blatant challenge and threat to humankind desirous of global peace and security in the 21st century as they disclosed the sinister intention of the Japanese reactionaries.
    Nuclear weaponization is an ambition long pursued by the Japanese reactionaries.
    Japan has stockpiled plutonium enough to produce 4.000 nuclear weapons.
    Japan has reached the world's top level in technologies for the production of nuclear weapons and means of nuclear delivery.
    Japan can emerge a nuclear power any time if it has a will. It is the ulterior intention of Japan to have access to lots of nuclear weapons at any cost, claiming that it was defeated in the second world war because it was weak and it did not possess any nuclear weapon.
    Japan is not a non-nuclear state but a very dangerous nuclear war force. The Japanese reactionaries are pulling up their neighbouring countries over "arms build-up." This is nothing but a subterfuge to justify their moves to convert Japan into a military power and step up its nuclear weaponization.
    Japan is keen to realize its ambition for overseas aggression with nuclear weapons any moment.
    The first target of its nuclear attack is the DPRK. Japan is vociferating about a "nuclear threat" from the DPRK in a bid to start a war.
    Japan's nuclear weaponization leads to its self-destruction.

Kim Yong Nam meets delegations of Nigeria and Guinea

    Pyongyang, April 19 (KCNA) -- Kim Yong Nam, member of the political bureau of the Central Committee of the Workers' Party of Korea and President of the Presidium of the Supreme People's Assembly of the DPRK, met and had a friendly talk with a delegation of the People's Democratic Party of Nigeria led by Muhammed Inuwa Rabaran, national organizational secretary of the party, at the Mansudae Assembly Hall yesterday. On the occasion the head of the delegation said that the leadership of the people's democratic party of Nigeria is attaching great importance to the friendly and cooperative relations with the WPK. He expressed the firm belief that these relations would grow stronger in the future, too. Kim Yong Nam met and had a friendly talk with the Guinean government delegation led by Jean-Paul Sarr, minister of agriculture and stockbreeding, at the Mansudae Assembly Hall on the same day.
    The head of the delegation said that President Kim Il Sung was the great leader of the world progressives. He will always live in the hearts of not only the Korean people but the Guinean people, he noted.
    The government and the people of guinea will always fully support the independent and peaceful reunification of Korea, he declared.

Talks held between delegations of WPK and Moldovan political party

Pyongyang, April 19 (KCNA) -- Talks between the delegations of the Workers' Party of Korea and the party of communists of the Moldovan Republic were held here yesterday. Present there were Kim Ki Nam, secretary of the Central Committee of the WPK, officials concerned and the members of the delegation of the party of communists of the Moldovan Republic led by Valery Garev, secretary of its central committee.
The talks proceeded in a friendly atmosphere.

Reception given by Vietnamese ambassador

    Pyongyang, April 19 (KCNA) -- Do Thi Hoa, Vietnamese ambassador to the DPRK, gave a reception at the embassy last evening on the occasion of the 90th birth anniversary of President Kim Il Sung and the 70th anniversary of the heroic Korean People's Army. The ambassador in a speech said:
    The feats performed by Kim Il Sung will be immortal. He devoted his all to the reunification of Korea and the freedom of the world people.
    The Vietnamese people always remember the support and cooperation extended by him to the struggle for Vietnam's unification and maintain strong friendship with the fraternal Korean people.
    The ambassador expressed belief that the fraternal Korean people would build a powerful nation and achieve the independent and peaceful reunification of the country without fail under the leadership of Kim Jong Il.
    Speaking next, Choe Thae Bok, chairman of the Supreme People's Assembly of the DPRK, said that Kim Il Sung founded the immortal Juche idea and led the revolution and construction to a victory and thus enabled the Korean people to become the most proud and dignified people, and the KPA to grow to be invincible revolutionary armed forces and performed distinguished feats on behalf of the human history. The relations between the peoples of Korea and Vietnam are the friendly relations based on the close relations forged between Kim Il Sung and Ho Chi Minh, he said, stressing: we will in the future, too, value the friendship with the Vietnamese people and strive to steadily consolidate and develop it in the interests of socialism and the two peoples.

DPRK degree of doctor awarded to Chinese citizen

    Pyongyang, April 19 (KCNA) -- A DPRK degree of doctor of medical science was awarded to Bai Shuying, vice-director of the centre for the treatment of diabetes in Liaoning Province, China. According to a decision of the state commission for conferring degrees and titles of the DPRK, she was awarded the degree in recognition of her great contribution to the friendship and solidarity between the Korean and Chinese peoples and the development of medical science and technology.
    A ceremony of awarding the degree was held at the Mansudae Assembly Hall yesterday.
    Present there were vice-premier Jo Chang Dok who is the chairman of the commission, Kang Chun Gum, secretary of the commission, and other officials concerned.
    Chinese ambassador to the DPRK Wu Donghe and Chinese guests were also on hand.

Anecdotes about Kim Il Sung

    Pyongyang, April 19 (KCNA) -- One autumn day in Juche 47 (1958) President Kim Il Sung mounted the Ulmil pavilion on Moran Hill with a head of state of a foreign country to enjoy a bird's-eye view of Pyongyang. A cameraman who was accompanying him went up a high stone wall to have a better position to photograph.
    The president hurried to support him.
    The cameraman, much embarrassed, intended to come down.
    But the president told him to stay there until he finished his job.
    He advised the cameraman not to mount such a dangerous place without any helper in the future.
    One day in July Juche 47 (1958) he visited the Yaksu Senior Middle School in Changsong county, North Phyongan Province. While carefully examining stuffed specimens of various animals at a biological study room the president found that there was no specimen of a heron.
    After his field guidance to several units of the county he went for hunting with a hunting gun, saying that showing something once is better than teaching something several times.
    Climbing up and down the valley for a long while, he succeeded in hunting a heron.
    A wonderful specimen of a heron was thus put on display at the Yaksu Senior Middle School next day. One day in May Juche 57 (1968) the president provided field guidance to Chongsan-ri, Kangso county, South Phyongan Province.
    Seeing rice seedlings in paddy fields turning yellow in the dry season because of irrigation water mixed with sea water, the president instructed officials to supply fresh water to them even by pumping water from Thaesong Lake.
    Then he headed for the lake.
    He arrived at the lake when darkness was setting in. He bent to cup the water and tasted it.
    It was none other than the president who even tasted the water of a lake, worried about the farming.
    This was how fresh water of Thaesong Lake was sent to fields in Chongsan-ri.

Revolutionary fighter Kang Pan Sok

    Pyongyang, April 19 (KCNA) -- April 21 marks the 110th birth anniversary of indomitable revolutionary fighter Kang Pan Sok. She was born to a poor peasant family in Chilgol, Mangyongdae district, Pyongyang, in 1892.
    She married Kim Hyong Jik, leader of the anti-Japanese national liberation movement in Korea, and took the road of struggle to help him in his revolutionary activities.
    She provided many revolutionaries coming to meet Kim Hyong Jik from all parts of the country and abroad with lodging and boarding and creditably carried out such difficult tasks as delivery of secret information and transport of weapons.
    She also sincerely helped President Kim Il Sung who took the road of revolution, true to the intention of his father Kim Hyong Jik.
    She formed the Anti-Japanese Women's Association, the first revolutionary women's organization in Korea, on December 26, Juche 15 (1926) and worked as chairwoman of the association under the guidance of the president.
    Since the president founded the anti-Japanese guerrilla army she had exerted all her efforts to assist the army.
    She devoted herself and her family to the country and the revolution.
    At her dying hour she left a will not to move her remains to the homeland before the country became free. She died at the age of 40 on July 31, 1932.
    The Korean people erected her statue before her native house and a bust before her grave in Mangyongdae district, Pyongyang, to hand her revolutionary exploits down to posterity.
    A revolutionary school and a senior middle school were named after her.
    A lot of literary and art works and books on her revolutionary activities have been published.

Japanese imperialists' crime against humanity disclosed

    Pyongyang, April 19 (KCNA) -- The DPRK Measure Committee for Demanding Compensation to "Comfort Women for the Army" and the victims of the pacific war yesterday released a report on the recently disclosed part of the sexual slavery committed at the 19th Ranam division of the Japanese imperial army present in Korea. According to it, sites of "comfort stations" operated by the division were recently discovered in Phunggok-dong, Ranam district, Chongjin city, North Hamgyong Province. During their occupation of Korea the Japanese imperialists set up "comfort stations" in Phunggol, Ranam city (from neighborhood unit no.18 to 22 of Phunggok-dong at present).
    The Japanese military decided to set up "brothels" to serve the Japanese army and authorized Japanese businessmen to run them from the time the division was formed. since the middle of the 1930s they converted the place into a "comfort" settlement comprising "comfort stations" for officers and soldiers and clinics as their war of invasion escalated.
    The "stations" were mainly used by Japanese troops. They were built and managed by Japanese businessmen with an approval of the military.
    Women who were forced to serve the Japanese army as their sexual slaves at those "stations" were Korean women whose age averaged 15 to 30 and most of them were from the southern part of Korea such as Kyonggi, Jolla and Kyongsang provinces.
    They were not allowed to speak in Korean and go out but were practically detained there, subject to rules of "comfort stations".
    Not a few women were murdered due to the Japanese soldiers' sexual abuses or committed suicides unable to live anymore as shameful "comfort women."
    The Phunggol "comfort stations" appeared to be operated by non-governmental businessmen but they were managed and controlled by the military in reality.
    Police boxes were built at the entrance of the "comfort stations" and mps intensified their patrol as part of their strict watch and control of the stations.
    All these facts go to clearly prove that the sexual slavery by the Japanese imperialists was enforced in top secrecy in Korea on which the Japanese imperialist aggression army first set foot and that they adopted it as part of their policy and committed organized sexual abuses in the course of their invasion of the continent.

Paek Nam Sun meets Thai Rak Thai party delegation

Pyongyang, April 19 (KCNA) -- Paek Nam Sun, minister of foreign affairs of the DPRK, yesterday met and had a friendly talk with the delegation of the Thai Rak Thai Party led by Krasae Chanawongse, member of its executive committee, which paid a courtesy call on him.