Kim Il Sung Remembered

By a New Worker correspondent



A successful seminar was held last week at the John Buckle Centre in London to mark the 98th anniversary of the birth of the great Korean revolutionary leader Kim Il Sung, organised by the Friends of Korea (FOK). In Democratic Korea this is celebrated at the Sun’s Day and all over the world friends of Korea held events last week to join with the Korean people in remembering their great son.
Workers Weekly editor Michael Chant and Dermot Hudson from the UK Korea Friendship Association presented short papers to kick off the discussion on the life and times of Kim Il Sung at the RCPB (ML) headquarters in London which kicked off a lively discussion for the rest of the evening.
Many in the room including the chair, Ella Rule (CPGB (ML), and the two opening speakers, had visited Democratic Korea over the years. NCP leader Andy Brooks and Chris Coleman of the RCPB (ML) talked about Kim Il Sung’s immense contribution to national liberation and the world communist movement while Jang Song Chol from the DPR Korea embassy in London told the seminar of his country’s current struggle to defend its independence and socialist way of life. Comrade Jang said that after the counter-revolutions in 1990 the DPRK’s enemies predicted its collapse in 3 or 4 years, yet the country went on to launch two satellites and carry out two nuclear tests. Jang said that the new Obama administration in the United States appeared to be friendly, suggesting “work with us, you don’t need nuclear weapons”; yet the new US “nuclear posture” announced last week singled out the DPRK and Iran for nuclear weapons targeting.
“A wolf is a wolf,” said Jang. “You can’t disguise it as a lamb”.
Everyone agreed with that and with a letter of greetings and congratulations to mark the Sun’s Day that was sent to DPRK leader Kim Jong Il.

London friends send solidarity message on Sun's Day

CO-ORDINATING COMMITTEE OF FRIENDS OF KOREA
c/o 170 Wandsworth Road, London SW8 2LA.


April 8th 2010 (Juche 99)

Kim Jong Il
General Secretary, Workers’ Party of Korea
Chairman, DPRK National Defence Commission
Pyongyang
Democratic People’s Republic of Korea



Dear Comrade Kim Jong Il,

On the auspicious occasion of Sun’s Day, celebrating the 98th anniversary of the day of the birth of the great leader President Kim Il Sung on April 15, we would like to convey to you and to the Korean people heartfelt greetings and congratulations. President Kim Il Sung was a great leader respected by progressive people throughout the world. He is cherished and loved as someone who dedicated his entire life and all his energies to the people’s cause. He was a revolutionary who welded the mass and revolutionary movements in Korea into an indivisible whole.

April 25th also marks the 78th anniversary of the founding of the Korean People’s Army. Since its founding by Comrade Kim Il Sung during the anti-Japanese war and under his leadership, the KPA has played a heroic role to ensure the success of the national liberation of Korea and of the socialist nation-building project.

Comrade Kim Jong Il, April 9th also marks the 17th anniversary of your election as Chairman of the DPRK National Defence Commission. Under your wise leadership and Songun policy, the Korean people are achieving unprecedented victories in strengthening the social system of their choice, and defending the DPRK’s independence against all the hostile threats of the imperialist powers. In so doing, the Korean people are inspired by your will and desire to serve humanity by building a strong and powerful nation, which is an indispensable and decisive force in the context of the people’s struggles worldwide to bring an end to war and aggression. We see today in your work to guarantee the Korean people’s unity and courageous defence of their homeland against the imperialists, the living legacy of Comrade Kim Il Sung’s revolutionary leadership.

We denounce all the provocations of the US imperialists and their instrument, the hostile regime in south Korea, to attempt to bring down the socialist system in the DPRK by force of arms and reverse the advances made to achieve national reunification. We reiterate our support of the struggle of the Korean people to achieve the denuclearisation of the Korean Peninsula and a lasting peace based on justice. Despite the setbacks caused by reaction and retrogression, we are sure that the unanimous wish of the Korean people to peacefully reunify their homeland will come to fruition in the not-too-distant future. The Korean people who are responding to the necessities of the time, rising as one in a new revolutionary upsurge to build a prosperous nation under the Songun-based leadership of the Workers' Party of Korea, are an inspiration to all the world’s progressive forces.

Dear Comrade Kim Jong Il, we wish you on this occasion the best of health and a long life. We stand shoulder to shoulder with you and the Korean people in our common cause of independence, socialism and a future fit for humanity.

adopted at the meeting celebrating the Day of the Sun, 2010
John Buckle Centre, London
Thursday, April 8th 2010

Defence of DPRK Is a Must!

The peoples of the world today desire peace, and are opposed to any doctrine that suggests a pre-emptive war is necessary in order to achieve peace.
One of the targets of this doctrine is the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK). Contrary to reactionary propaganda, the DPRK is in no way a threat to peace. The DPRK in fact stands for the peaceful reunification of the Korean peninsula without outside interference, and in building a social system in which the people are in control of their own destiny, North Korea is also a powerful factor for peace.
The DPRK points out what is in fact the case, that the main threat to world peace and security is the striving by the United States for domination and dictate. They will not let their sovereign country go the way of Iraq and Afghanistan, and are prepared to resist open declarations of war by the traitorous regime in the south of Korea.
The people of the DPRK are forging ahead with building a prosperous country, but are having to do so in conditions of a divided Korean peninsula, tens of thousands of US soldiers stationed in the south with their nuclear threat, the threat of aggression from the south at the instigation of the US, and punitive and unjust sanctions.
In these conditions, the DPRK has taken the initiative and is calling for a formal peace treaty to replace the armistice agreement, still in place after the conclusion of the Korean War in 1953. They have pointed out that if mutual confidence is to be built between the DPRK and the US, it is essential to conclude a peace treaty for terminating the state of war, a root cause of the hostile relations, to begin with.
Anglo-US reaction, together with the hostile propagandists of south Korea, are attempting to combine military threats with slanders, lies and disinformation about the DPRK in order to turn back the clock, keep the Korean Peninsula divided and wipe out the gains that the people of the DPRK have achieved under socialism. The disinformation about the so-called "human rights issues" and the "nuclear issue", and the smearing of the DPRK as a "hermit kingdom", as a "failed" or "illegal" state, must be opposed by all democratic forces. The defence of the DPRK’s right to be is a must! Hands off Korea!
It is in this context that the Friends of Korea are organising this public meeting, which also marks the anniversary of the birth of leader of the Korean people Kim Jong Il, which falls on February 16. Kim Jong Il is the General Secretary of the Workers’ Party of Korea, the Chairman of the National Defence Commission, and the Supreme Commander of the Korean People’s Army. In these capacities, he has led the Korean people in solving crucial tasks in building the DPRK as a powerful socialist society, in formulating significant concepts and programmes which put the Korean people in control of their own destiny, and in building the military defence of the DPRK which sets in motion the initiative of the Korean people in making the DPRK impregnable against imperialist aggression.
Friends of Korea calls on everyone who is interested not only in the situation on the Korean Peninsula, but in taking a stand against warmongering and aggression, to attend this public meeting. A panel comprised of participating organisations and individuals from Friends of Korea will make brief remarks, lead discussion and take questions regarding the reality of the DPRK and its role in world affairs.

Friends of Korea statement

Defending Democratic Korea

by a New Worker correspondent



FRIENDS of Korea met at London’s historic Marx House last Saturday to celebrate the 68th anniversary of the birth of Comrade Kim Jong Il and take part in discussion on the current situation in the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea, led by a panel of speakers who have all visited north Korea many times.
The meeting was held under the title of “The Defence of the DPRK is a must” and that was the theme of speakers, who included New Communist Party leader Andy Brooks, Michael Chant of the Revolutionary Communist Party of Britain (Marxist-Leninist), John McCleod of the Socialist Labour Party, Keith Bennett and Ella Rule (Communist Party of Great Britain-Marxist-Leninist) and Dermot Hudson from the United Kingdom Korean Friendship Association.
All paid tribute to Comrade Kim Jong Il, and his great leadership of the Korean people. A message of congratulations to Comrade Kim Jong Il was unanimously adopted with great enthusiasm by all present, expressing unbounded admiration, pledging that the progressive forces in Britain would always stand shoulder to shoulder with the Korean people in their struggles to build a powerful socialist country, against US imperialist aggression, and for the peaceful reunification of the Korean Peninsula. The message also placed on record the demand of the British people that the United States sign a peace treaty with the DPRK, and that it remove all its troops from the peninsula and end all threats to the DPRK.
The panel and participants from the audience expressed unreserved support for the DPRK in defending its right to be, and explained how the DPRK was above all standing by its principles of maintaining its independence and building socialism. The panel explained at length aspects of the life of the people of the DPRK, and elaborated on the stand of Democratic Korea in regard to the Six-Party Talks, the striving of the DPRK to create the conditions for the denuclearisation of the Korean Peninsula, and its contribution to combating the aggressive and hostile stands of US imperialism and its allies. The meeting expressed contempt for the anti-communism, which is a relic of the Cold War. It pledged to redouble its efforts in earnest to combat the disinformation spread about the DPRK and build friendship with the Korean people and their leadership.
The questions, answers and discussion could have gone on much longer, as the scheduled time for the conclusion of the meeting came. Participants continued to discuss the exploits of the great leaders Comrade Kim Il Sung and Comrade Kim Jong Il, and pledged further to build the Friends of Korea as a powerful friendship organisation which unites all friends of Korea in Britain.

Congratulatory message to Kim Jong Il

Co-ordinating Committee of Friends of Korea
c/o 170 Wandsworth Road, London SW8 2LA.


February 13, 2010 (Juche 99)

Comrade Kim Jong Il
General Secretary, Workers’ Party of Korea
Chairman, National Defence Commission
Pyongyang
Democratic People’s Republic of Korea


Dear Comrade Kim Jong Il,

This meeting, organised by the Friends of Korea in Britain, would like to convey to you our warmest congratulations on the important occasion of the 68th anniversary of your birth on February 16, and wish you all good health and a long, long life. We send you our very best wishes for the continued success of your great work in these dangerous and decisive times.
The Korean people are one people and your outstanding contribution to bringing closer the reunification of the country is an inspiration to all those who hold dear the sovereignty and independence of the peoples of the world.
Your tireless contribution to the struggle for peace, progress and security against aggression and war, not only on the Korean Peninsula but also on the world scale is indeed an example from which all democratic people can learn. We Friends of Korea in Britain are inspired also in our struggles by the heroic example of the single-hearted unity of the Korean people under your leadership. The firm stands of the DPRK under your leadership against the US imperialists and their allies in Britain in their attempts to stifle the DPRK and to slander it as a “rogue state” are a great contribution to the anti-imperialist struggles of the people.
We place on record our support for the demand that the old armistice regime, a product of the Cold War, be replaced by a peace treaty as a first step towards creating a peaceful environment on the Korean Peninsula. We demand that all US troops be removed from the Korean Peninsula forthwith, and that all attempts to destabilise the DPRK be ended immediately.
We stand shoulder to shoulder with you and the Korean people under your great leadership, and express our common conviction that humanity will achieve a better world where the people are the masters of their own destiny.

Adopted by the meeting marking the 68th anniversary of the birth of Comrade Kim Jong Il
Marx House, London, UK – Saturday, February 13, 2009

Signed by participating organisations:

Communist Party of Great Britain (Marxist-Leninist)
European Regional Society for the Study of the Juche Idea
UK Korean Friendship Association
New Communist Party of Britain
Revolutionary Communist Party of Britain (Marxist-Leninist)
Socialist Labour Party