Eyewitness Korea

 

Alan Bolon and Dermot Hudson

by New Worker correspondent

The DPR Korea is marching along the road to socialism. That was the message of Dermot Hudson who has recently returned from a visit to north Korea and that was the main theme of his talk at a Korean Friendship Association (KFA) meeting in the central London last weekend.
Andy Brooks and Michael Chant, the leaders of the NCP and the RCPB (ML), were in the audience that included other KFA members in London and a guest from KFA Poland. The meeting was also livestreamed on the internet which attracted participation throughout the world.
Dermot Hudson said that the people’s government is carrying out massive construction work in the capital, Pyongyang and that he saw the newly built Hwasong Street neighbourhood that is about the same size as a London borough or a small city. He said that the DPR Korea is carrying out massive housing construction not under ideal conditions but under the pressure of sanctions and military threats. But there are no homeless or beggars in the DPRK – unlike other Asian countries under the thumb of imperialism.
Dermot also spoke about his recent trip to Germany at the invitation of KFA Germany – taking part in a May Day march in Kassel, visiting the DPRK embassy in Berlin as well as the Volkskammer restaurant and the Ernst Thalmann Memorial Centre in Hamburg that reflects on Germany's communist history.
The meeting also heard Alan Bolon from the West of England branch of the KFA give a talk on the Juche Idea using a flip chart with diagrams to illustrate different aspects of the ideology that is the foundation of Korean-style socialism.

Remembering the Korean people’s victory

Dermot Hudson and Song Gi Kim

by New Worker correspondent

London comrades returned to the Chadswell centre in central London last weekend to mark the outbreak of the Korean war. The war began with an American attack on the people’s government in north Korea on 25th June 1950. It ended with the Americans signing a humiliating armistice on 27th July 1953.

    Chaired by Dermot Hudson speakers, including Theo Russell from the NCP, spoke about the Korean people’s heroic fight against the US imperialists and their lackeys during the war and their efforts to reconstruct their shattered country after the guns fell silent.
Though the American terror bombers had left north Korea in ruins, the masses rallied round the call of Kim Il Sung and the Workers’ Party of Korea to rebuild their shattered country and lead the drive for a modern, independent socialist republic in the free part of the Korean peninsula.
    Song Gi Kim, a representative from the Democratic Korean (DPRK) embassy in London pointed out that "in 1950 the Korean war, the fiercest war since the Second World War, broke out. At that time no one ever thought that the DPRK, founded two years before, would defeat the United States, which had been boasting of being the "strongest" in the world with a history of victory in 110 wars since its founding.
    “As the world media described, the war was a confrontation between the rifle and the atomic bomb. But the result of the war turned out to be the opposite. The DPRK, a small country in the East, created a miracle by defeating the multi-national forces, which pounced upon a country in the name of the United Nations for the first time in the world."
Dermot Hudson, in his speech, said that the great Korean communist leader, Kim Il Sung “not only humbled the pride of the arrogant US imperialists but smashed the reactionary bourgeois military theory that advocates the omnipotence of weapons over humans.
    “The US imperialists not only lost huge amounts of manpower and materials but also suffered irretrievable political and moral defeats. It was a great victory for the Korean people and opened up a new era of anti-US, anti-imperialist struggle. Indeed Korea was the war before Vietnam!"
    And Theo Russell pointed out that the US "cannot admit responsibility for aggression against DPRK in 1950 because US still dreams of occupying the north... thus entire might of US and Western systems of thought manipulation is mobilised to maintain the lie. And this includes an apparatus of news, well-financed think tanks, universities, mass media, intelligence agencies"

Day of the Shining Star in London

Michael Chant speaking

by New Worker correspondent

People battled their way through Storm Dennis to celebrate the Day of the Shining Star at a meeting in central London last weekend, organised by Korean Friendship Association (KFA) and the Friends of Korea (FoK) committee.

KFA Chair Dermot Hudson introduced the meeting, stressing the importance of the Day of the Shining Star and increasing solidarity with People's Korea. FoK Secretary Michael Chant, General Secretary of the RCPB-ML, spoke about the injustice of the sanctions against the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK), stressing the fact the UK is still maintaining the European Union (EU) sanctions against the DPRK despite leaving the EU!

A contribution from the DPRK’s London Embassy was read out. Part of it read: “February 16 is the birthday of Kim Jong Il, eternal Chairman of the National Defence Commission of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. When the day comes round every year, many people of the world recall him with deep emotion.

“Kim Jong Il devoted his whole life for the cause of global peace. He led the struggle to build a new world free from aggression and war upholding the banner of anti-imperialist independence.”

Womens’ rights in Democratic Korea

Andy Brooks and Dermot Hudson

By New Worker correspondent

Womens’ rights in Democratic Korea was the theme of a Korean Friendship Association (KFA) meeting in London last weekend. NCP leader Andy Brooks joined KFA chair, Dermot Hudson, in talking about the life of women in Juche Korea at the Chadswell Centre in central London on Saturday.

This month marks the 70^th anniversary of the passing away of Kim Jong Suk, the outstanding Korean guerrilla fighter who married great leader Kim Il Sung during the liberation war against Japanese colonialism.

The emancipation of women in the northern part of the Korean peninsula began when the people’s government was established after the defeat of Japanese imperialism in 1945. Thanks to the revolutionary work of Kim John Suk and the Juche-based socialist system women in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea enjoy real equality.

Day of the Shining Star in London

by New Worker correspondent

Andy Brooks remembers Kim Jong Il

Comrades and friends met in London last weekend to celebrate the birthday of Democratic Korean leader Kim Jong Il, who died at his post on 17th December 2011.

Kim Jong Il steered the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) through the difficult times that followed the death of great leader Kim Il Sung in 1994. He devoted his entire life to serving the Korean people in the cause of building a human-centred society, a cause that is espoused by democratic and anti-imperialist forces the world over.

Called by the Korean Friendship Association (KFA), the meeting was opened by Dermot Hudson who spoke about Kim Jong Il’s outstanding contribution to the world communist movement. Shaun Pickford gave a detailed and in-depth presentation on Kim Jong Il’s contribution to Juche and Culture, which is national in form and socialist in content, and NCP leader Andy Brooks recalled fond memories of when he took part in the commemorations in the DPRK in February 2000.

Every year the Korean people mark Kim Jong Il’s birthday, which has long been known as the ‘Day of the Shining Star’ in the DPRK.

Kim Jong Il was born in the midst of the struggle against Japanese imperialism, in a Korean guerrilla camp on Mount Paektu, on 16th February 1942. His early days were those of hardship and struggle, which ended in victory in 1945 and the liberation of Pyongyang. Like millions of Koreans of his generation, Kim Jong Il dedicated his life to the Workers’ Party of Korea (WPK) and the socialist system that they were determined to build in order to create a better life for the Korean people.

Kim Jong Il went to university where he developed his ideas in the political, economic and cultural fields. Like all Korean students, he took his turn at manual labour with the people in the fields and on the construction sites.

Kim Jong Il developed the Juche idea, applying it to all spheres of economic construction and for the promotion of north–south dialogue for the independent peaceful reunification of Korea. His modesty, faithful service, tireless work, total loyalty to Kim Il Sung and the Korean revolution, and undoubted ability meant that when the WPK considered the question of the succession – and this was decided long before Kim Il Sung’s death – Kim Jong Il was the unchallenged candidate to be the successor to great leader Kim Il Sung.

When Kim Il Sung passed away, Kim Jong Il told the Korean people and the world that they could “expect no change from me” and under his leadership the WPK won further victories. Natural disasters were overcome. Imperialist diplomatic isolation was broken and the intrigues of US imperialism exposed.

Now Kim Jong Un is following in the footsteps of Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il to lead the DPRK into the 21st century. Democratic Korean citizens enjoy full employment, free education and medical care, virtually free housing and a vast array of consumer goods largely made in the DPRK itself. Democratic Korean scientists have mastered the secrets of the atom to guarantee the DPRK’s defence and energy needs, and Korean rockets now reach for the stars.