Pyongyang, August 27 (KCNA) -- Kim Jong Il, general secretary of the Workers' Party of Korea and chairman of the DPRK National Defence Commission, Saturday sent a message of thanks to Hu Jintao, general secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and president of the People's Republic of China, on his way home after visiting Northeast China.

The message said:

I extend warm greetings to you, the close comrades of the collective leadership of the Communist Party of China and the fraternal Chinese people on my way home after visiting Northeast China in the wake of my visit to the Siberian and Far East regions of the Russian Federation.

I express deep thanks to the central and local leading officials and people for the warm reception and cordial hospitality accorded to us.

We once again witnessed the great vitality of the line and policy of the CPC, passing through Northeast China which conjures up unforgettable memory and more keenly felt the worth of the traditional DPRK-China friendship.

I am pleased that the DPRK-China relations are energetically developing in various fields in the spirit agreed upon in the course of our meetings and convinced that the DPRK-China friendship provided by the revolutionaries of the elder generation of the two countries at the cost of blood would invariably grow strong generation after generation in the conformity with the mutual interests and desire of the two peoples in the future, too.

I sincerely wish the fraternal Chinese people greater success in their struggle for building rich and powerful and harmonious socialism with Chinese characteristics under the correct leadership of the CPC.