Pyongyang, December 25 (KCNA) -- Kim Jong Un, vice-chairman of the Central Military Commission of the Workers' Party of Korea, received a condolence message from Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad Saturday.

The president in his message said he could not repress grief at the news that HE Kim Jong Il, the great leader of the DPRK, passed away.

Expressing condolences to Kim Jong Un and to the governmen Pyongyang, December 25 (KCNA) -- The south Korean newspaper Hangyore on Dec. 23 editorially lashed out at the south Korean authorities for blocking condolatory visits to the north.

The editorial referred to the fact that an opposition party proposed on Dec. 22 to form a mourners' group consisting of mainly members of the People's Council for National Reconciliation and Cooperation to be sent to the north.

It said that the council is an organization having competency enough to convey the south side's intention of sharing sorrow with the north as it is made up of ruling and opposition parties, religious circles and civic and social organizations.

The present chief executive of south Korea, however, opposed this proposal, the editorial noted, and continued:

The "government" claimed that only in case the north sends a mourners' group to the south, it allows a condolatory visit in return for the visit. The action taken to block the condolatory visit by the Roh Moo Hyun Foundation was too narrow-minded behavior quite contrary to reason.

It urged the "government" not to block condolatory visits to the north, whether they are "government"-level or non-governmental level and whether they are visits by politicians or by media persons.