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North Korean leader Kim Jong Un delivered a speech at a rare military parade in Pyongyang before dawn earlier today to mark the 75th anniversary of the founding of the ruling Workers’ Party.
Kim thanked the military for helping rebuild the country after the catastrophic storms that hit the country in the summer and praised the efforts made to prevent a Covid-19 outbreak.
Stating “grateful” that, as he himself put it, no North Korean had been infected with the new coronavirus, he argued that the Covid-19 pandemic “could not have been avoided without socialism.” He also said he was confident that the crisis would be resolved and that “the people of the two Koreas will again join hands.”
Today’s anniversary is celebrated in North Korea with a series of concerts and festivals and is closely monitored as it is seen as an opportunity for Kim to convey messages both within and outside of his country.
North Korean state television began broadcasting images of the military parade hours after it ended. The program began with the image of a propaganda poster, with three North Koreans holding a hammer, sickle and brush, symbols of the regime and the slogan “The greatest victory of our great party.”
The parade
“Evidence of a military parade, involving weapons and large numbers of people, was detected this morning in Kim Il Sung Square,” the South Korean Armed Forces General Staff said in a statement. The intelligence services of South Korea and the United States are “closely monitoring developments,” he added.
For weeks, commercial satellite imagery has shown thousands of North Korean soldiers on foot, and South Korean officials have said North Korea could use a parade to unveil a new ICBM or rocket-powered grenade launcher.
This parade took place in a very heavy internal context mainly due to the Covid-19 epidemic. North Korea, which has not confirmed a single case in its territory, closed its borders in January to try to stop the spread of the virus.
Unlike previous parades, no foreign media were invited. Many embassies are closed due to restrictive sanitary measures, resulting in a limited number of foreign observers.
