North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has visited a newly rebuilt museum to mark atrocities committed by U.S. forces during the 1950-53 Korean War, the North's media said Thursday, a visit made ahead of the 62nd anniversary of the signing of an armistice.
Kim went to Sinchon Museum, which exhibits relics and data of what the North calls the brutal crimes committed by the U.S., including the killing of some 35,000 North Koreans during the conflict, according to the Korean Central News Agency. It did not specify when Kim visited there.
In November last year, Kim instructed its officials to rebuild the museum, which was set up in 1960. The North has used the museum as a center for anti-U.S. propaganda and education.
The armistice that ended the Korean War was signed on July 27, 1953, leaving South and North Korea technically in a state of war. The North has designated the day as "Victory Day." The KCNA said Kim gave instructions to intensify anti-U.S. education through the museum.
"He said the museum served as a center for class education and a source of the will to take revenge upon the enemy and a historic place bearing witness to the U.S. imperialists' monstrous atrocities," it said.
Kim said North Korea should force the U.S. to "pay for the bloodshed of Koreans and settle accounts with it with arms without fail," the report added.
His entourage included Hwang Pyong-so, director of the general political department of the Korean People's Army, and Kim Ki-nam, a party secretary in charge of the North's propaganda work.
Kim, 68, reappeared in the North's media reports after having not been seen in public since April.
His absence from the public scene spawned speculation that Kim Yo-jong, the younger sister of the North's leader, might be controlling the party's propaganda department.
"There has been speculation over whether he retired or was punished," a government official said. "But as Kim returned to the public eye, it seems that he is normally doing jobs on propaganda work." (Yonhap)
