Opinion

The word “youth” is regarded as a symbol of performance of feats and miracles and the pride of the nation today in the DPRK. 

The honourable tradition dates back to 1945 when Korea was liberated. 

Busy as he was building the Party, the state and the army after Korea’s liberation from Japanese military rule, General Kim Il Sung paid special attention to the youth issue and organized the preparatory committee for the formation of the Democratic Youth League of North Korea in a consultative meeting of Young Communist League officials in South Phyongan Province in October 1945 and made sure that preparations were made for a conference of active democratic youth. 

That day, he clarified the matter of dissolving the Young Communist League in favour of advance and forming the Democratic Youth League to involve broader sections of young people and specified the direction and ways to that end, including the programme, rules and inaugural declaration. 

As a result, the Democratic Youth League of North Korea was founded on January 17 1946. 

As they realized the inexhaustible might of patriotism and unity as members of the Juche-oriented youth organization, the Korean young people fought for the country and the people at the risk of their lives during the fierce Fatherland Liberation War, demonstrated the spirit of youth to the full in the vanguard of the post-war rehabilitation and performed world-startling miracles and feats in socialist construction. 

Chairman Kim Jong Il, who illuminated the way ahead of the youth league in every period and at every stage of the revolution, designated Youth Day and put forward the slogan “Love young people!” so that millions of members of the young vanguard could lead an honourable life as soldiers and disciples of the President. 

Therefore, the young people made breakthroughs in major fields of socialist construction in the 1990s, one of the most difficult times for the country, and monumental structures shining with the name of youth rose up one after another across the country. 

Today, the Korean youth movement has greeted a heyday under the leadership of the respected Comrade Kim Jong Un. 

Thanks to his belief that the prosperous future will be accelerated by the dynamic efforts of young people and his trust and love for them who have always been advancing straight forward following the Party, those who had been lagging behind others made a new start of their lives amid the blessings of the whole country and the miracle of building a gigantic dam breaking the rated capacity despite the severe cold of northern part of the country was performed. 

Since the Fourth Plenary Meeting of the Eighth Central Committee of the Workers’ Party of Korea and the 10th congress of the youth league, numerous young men and women joined the army or volunteered to work at coal and other mines, rural areas and development sites to perform miraculous feats, and the enthusiasm for volunteering is still growing among young people. 

The 70-odd years of the Korean youth who have displayed their resourcefulness and courage by invariably advancing straight forward by breaking through unprecedentedly harsh trials following the Party is a course of unusual pride and self-esteem of them who have upheld great leaders generation after generation.