Present there on invitation were Choe Jin Su, DPRK ambassador to China, his embassy officials, the delegation of the Foreign Languages Publishing House on a visit to China and DPRK students studying in China.

Attending it were Li Jinhua, vice-chairman of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, Chen Haosu, president of the Chinese People's Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries, Wu Donghe, chairman of the China-Korea Friendship Association, Hu Zhengyue, assistant to the foreign minister of China, and other officials concerned of the Ministry of Railways, the General Staff of the Chinese People's Liberation Army, etc.

The president of the Chinese People's Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries said at the reception that visits of high-ranking officials and cooperation and exchange in various fields have become very brisk and diverse events taken place in different domains between the two countries since the announcement of the "year of Sino-DPRK friendship."

He noted that the fraternal Korean people have made great successes in socialist construction in the spirit of self-reliance and fortitude, closely rallied around the Workers' Party of Korea led by General Secretary Kim Jong Il.

He expressed the belief that the Korean people having glorious revolutionary traditions would make new steady successes in the work to accelerate socialist construction while pulling through difficulties before them, preserve peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula, achieve the independent and peaceful reunification of the country and open the gate to a great prosperous and powerful socialist nation in 2012.

The DPRK ambassador said that the traditional DPRK-China friendship personally provided and fostered by President Kim Il Sung and the revolutionaries of the elder generation of China is growing stronger under the deep care of the top leaders of the two countries.

It is the consistent stand of the Korean party and government to set store by the DPRK-China friendship and consolidate and develop it generation after generation, he said, expressing the will to strive for the development of the friendly and cooperative relations between the two countries.