Politics

Massive ceremony held in Pyongyang on Kim Jong-il’s 10th death anniversary

Seoul, Dec 18 (EFE).- A massive ceremony in Pyongyang was among the events held to commemorate the 10th death anniversary of Kim Jong-il, the father of the country’s incumbent leader, Kim Jong-un, state-run agency KCNA reported Saturday.

The ceremony was held on Friday outside the Kumsusan Palace of the Sun.

Kim Jong-un and other senior officials of the regime took part in the ceremony, which was broadcast by North Korean television network KCTV.

“Deep yearning and reverence of all the people across the country for Chairman Kim Jong Il, the eternal leader of our Party and people and great sage of the revolution, pervade the Kumsusan Palace of the Sun… on the greatest national memorial day,” KCNA wrote.

“Over the last ten years in which the holy history of the cause of perpetuating the memory of the leader has been given a steady continuity, our people have confidently advanced the socialist cause of Juche…under the guidance of the respected Comrade Kim Jong Un,” it added.

“Kim Jong Il is always with us, and the powerful socialist country wished for by him will surely be built as there is the respected Comrade Kim Jong Un,” Choe Ryong Hae, chairman of the standing committee of the country’s parliament, said in a speech during the ceremony.

Kim Jong-un did not speak at the event.

The North Korean leader also paid tribute to his father on Friday by visiting the Kumsusan Palace of the Sun in Pyongyang, where the bodies of Kim Jong-il and his father, Kim Il Sung, lie.

A floral basket was placed at the statues on behalf of Kim, who was accompanied by top officials of the ruling Workers’ Party, according to KCNA.

On Dec. 19, 2011, the North Korean regime announced that Kim Jong-il had died two days earlier of a heart attack while traveling on his private train.

Kim Jong-il was appointed successor to his father Kim Il-sung in 1974, and over the following years he began to expand his power base to become the de facto leader of the country.

He officially took over the reins of the country in 1994, the year in which Kim Il-sung, considered the founder of North Korea, passed away.

After Kim Jong-il suffered a stroke in 2008, procedures to ensure that his son, Kim Jong-un, would inherit command were accelerated.

Kim Jong-un first appeared in public at the end of 2010, when he was presented as a four-star general.

When his father died, state propaganda began to praise him and 10 days later he was appointed supreme commander of the army, the first step in the formalization of the succession process. EFE

asb-ahg/pd/ssk

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