Kim Jong Un (R) tours the Ch’angso’ng Revolutionary Site in Ch’angso’ng County, North P’yo’ngan Province (Photo: Rodong Sinmun).

DPRK state media reported on 13 June (Thursday) that Kim Jong Un (Kim Cho’ng-u’n) toured different locales in Ch’angso’ng County, North P’yo’ngan Province and toured Taegwan Glass Factory.  Attending the visits were VMar Choe Ryong Hae (Director of the Korean People’s Army [KPA] General Political Department), Choe Hwi (Senior Deputy [1st vice] Director of the Korean Workers’ Party [KWP] Propaganda and Agitation Department), Pak Tae Song (Deputy KWP Department Director) and Ri Man Gon (Chief Secretary of the North P’yo’ngan KWP Provincial Committee).  Kim Jong Un’s last reported public appearance was his visit to the Pyongyang International Football (soccer) School, the Rungna Sports Park and the offices of the State Physical Culture and Sports Guidance Committee.

Kim Jong Un reviews a product display at Ch’angso’ng Foodstuffs Factory (Photo: Rodong Sinmun).

Kim Jong Un grins whilst touring a section of the Ch’angso’ng Foodstuffs Factory (Photo: Rodong Sinmun).

Kim Jong Un’s first stop in Ch’angso’ng County was to the Ch’angso’ng Foodstuffs Factory.  He toured the factory’s historical exhibition followed by “the milling work-team, liquor production work-team, confectionary production work-team, wild fruit processing work-team and the products show room and other various places of the factory.”  According to KCNA he “praised the employees of the factory and officials in the field concerned not only for building it well as befitting a base specializing in processing wild fruits but achieving a lot of successes in carrying out the instructions given by Kim Jong Il to take the lead in wild fruit processing” and “underscored the need for the factory to more energetically push forward technological updating, not resting content with the successes already achieved, and steadily raise the level of technical skills of the employees and meticulously organize the factory and business management.”  Kim Jong Un also “expressed expectation and belief that the employees of the factory would intensify the drive for increased production, bearing deep in mind the profound loving care shown by the great Generalissimos Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il for the people.”   He ended his visit by posing for commemorative photographs with factory managers and employees.

View of Ch’angso’ng-u’p, North P’yo’ngan Province (Photo: Google image)

Kim Jong Un (2nd R) is briefed about products of the Ch’angso’ng Foodstuffs Factory (Photo: Rodong Sinmun).

Kim Jong Un inspects a product of the Ch’angso’ng Foodstuffs Factory (Photo: Rodong Sinmun).

Kim Jong Un smokes a cigarettes and reads a menu at the Ch’angso’ng Restaurant (Photo: Rodong Sinmun).

Kim Jong Un holds a cigarette while touring a kitchen in Ch’angso’ng County, North P’yo’ngan Province (Photo: Rodong Sinmun).

Kim Jong Un also visited the Ch’angso’ng Restaurant and Ch’angso’ng Noodle House where he “asked about their accommodation capacity and measures to keep them provided with adequate quantities of foodstuff” and “underlined the need to promote culinary festival in order to further develop cooking culture as required by the new century.”  According to KCNA, Kim Jong Un “expressed expectation and belief that the employees of the restaurant and the noodle house would improve their service in the spirit of dedication to the people” and posed for commemorative photographs with the restaurants’ employees.  He then visited Undok Health Complex where he “called for more splendidly remodeling it, noting there can be no satisfaction in doing anything for the people.”

He later visited Ch’angso’ng-u’p, the county seat.  He “praised the builders for successfully constructing the town to suit the characteristics of the mountainous county” and “noting that the county is playing the role of a base for carrying out the three revolutions, ideological, technical and cultural, and vanguard in the struggle for defending the socialist system” Kim Jong Un “called on it to increase its role as required by the Military-First (So’ngun) era.”  Kim Jong Un toured the Ch’angso’ng Revolutionary Museum and was “briefed on it before the monument to the immortal revolutionary activities conducted by the great Generalissimos and Kim Hyong Jik, an outstanding leader of the anti-Japanese national liberation movement in Korea, in the land of Ch’angso’ng.”

Kim Jong Un tours Undok Health Complex in Ch’angso’ng County, North P’yo’ngan Province (Photo: Rodong Sinmun).

Kim Jong Un grins during a tour of the Ch’angso’ng Revolutionary Museum (Photo: Rodong Sinmun).

According to KCNA, he “called for sprucing up Changsong County as a people’s paradise and making hurrah for socialism ring out louder from the county” then attended a photo-op with museum employees.  Kim Jong Un then visited the Ch’angso’ng Revolutionary Historical Site and the the county’s cultural hall.  Of the revolutionary site he called for “preserving it on a permanent basis to educate party members and other people, soldiers and school youth and children in the immortal revolutionary exploits performed by Kim Il Sung in leading the Fatherland Liberation War (Korean War) to victory and his noble personality” and “proposed a task for creating art pieces depicting Kim Il Sung working at the revolutionary site.”  At the cultural hall, he watched a performance by Ch’angso’ng County’s art propaganda squad.  According to KCNA he “highly praised the members of the art group for giving a successful performance with great cognitional and instructive value by truthfully representing their life” then posed for commemorative photographs with the art squad’s members.

Kim Jong Un (C) poses for a commemorative photograph in front of a revolutionary historical marker at Ch’angso’ng Revolutionary Site (Photo: Rodong Sinmun)

Kim Jong Un (R) smokes a cigarette and talks with a subordinate during a performance by the Ch’angso’ng County art propaganda squad at the county’s cultural hall (Photo: Rodong Sinmun).

In August 1962, the late DPRK President and founder Kim Il Sung (paternal grandfather of Kim Jong Un) led the Joint Conference of Local Party and Economic Officials, which convened in Ch’angso’ng County.  The meeting resulted in the publication, under Kim Il Sung’s name, of “Theses on the Socialist Rural Question in Our Country.”  Kim Jong Il conducted multiple visits to sites Ch’angso’ng County and the county was established as a model for developing local economies in the DPRK.  According to one official DPRK text, “experience of Ch’angso’ng County, North P’yo’ngan Province, a county which after Comrade Kim Il Sung’s field guidance there, made good use of its mountains, comprising 90 per cent of its whole territory, and turned itself into a rich and modern county by developing livestock farming and local industry.”  The 50th anniversary of the Ch’angso’ng joint conference was held on 8 August 2012 at which a third generation of Kim treatises on the county, ”Let Us Build All Counties into People’s Paradise Good to Live in by Embodying Historic Spirit of Changsong Joint Conference” by Kim Jong Un, was read.  Ch’angso’ng County is also the location of a residential compound used by members of the Kim Family and other DPRK elites, which sits on the DPRK-China border.

View of the Kanam-ri residential complex of the Kim Family and other DPRK elites (Photo: Google image).

Kim Jong Un tours an assembling shop with CNC machines during a tour of Taegwan Glass Factory in North P’yo’ngan Province (Photo: Rodong Sinmun).

DPRK state media reported on 14 June (Friday) that Kim Jong Un visited the Taegwan Glass Factory in Taegwan County, North P’yo’ngan Province.  He inspected “the performance of the optical measuring instruments” and said that “it further improved the performance of the instruments than last year and ensured their safety. . .in order to make the instruments produced at the factory prove effective in reality, it is necessary to further raise their precision.  The inquiry into the performance of the instruments today proved that it is quite possible to succeed if endeavors are made, based on scientific researches and technological updating.”  Kim Jong Un also inspected other assembly and production sectors in the factory.  According to KCNA, he said “the optical measuring instruments being produced at the factory require high technology, stressing that in order to keep the production going at a high rate and improve their quality it is necessary to give full play to the mental power of the producers, intensify scientific researches and steadily raise the level of technical skills of the workers” and “underlined the need to focus efforts on the independent technological development capable of surpassing the world level, put the production processes on a modern and automatic basis and wage a more dynamic drive to raise the rate of locally available equipment and materials.”

Kim Jong Un “underscored the need to raise high demands to the units producing items of cooperative production and successfully conduct cooperative operations” then he inspected computer numerical control machines.  According to KCNA, he “set forth tasks which would serve as guidelines for the management and operation of the factory and production.”  After touring the factory, Kim Jong Un posed for commemorative photographs with factory employees, managers and officials “expressing expectation and belief that they would boost the production of quality and modern glass products and optical instruments by conducting a widespread mass technological innovation movement, true to the WPK’s idea of pushing back the frontiers of the latest science and technology.”

Commemorative Photo Watch

Kim Jong Un poses for a commemorative photograph with managers, officials and employees of Ch’angso’ng Foodstuffs Factory (Photo: Rodong Sinmun).

Kim Jong Un poses for a commemorative photograph with employees of a restaurant in Ch’angso’ng County, North P’yo’ngan Province (Photo: Rodong Sinmun).

Kim Jong Un poses for a commemorative photograph with restaurant employees in Ch’angso’ng County, North P’yo’ngan Province (Photo: Rodong Sinmun).

Kim Jong Un poses for a commemorative photograph with employees and officials of the Ch’angso’ng Revolutionary Museum (Photo: Rodong Sinmun).

Kim Jong Un (C) poses for a commemorative photograph with museum employees in front of a revolutionary historical marker at Ch’angso’ng Revolutionary Site (Photo: Rodong Sinmun)

Kim Jong Un poses for a commemorative photograph with members of the Ch’angso’ng County art propaganda squad in front of the county cultural hall (Photo: Rodong Sinmun).

Kim Jong Un “Smoke ‘em if you got ‘em” Watch

(Photos: Rodong Sinmun)

DPRK head of state Kim Yong Nam and other senior officials tour the Pyongyang Essential Foodstuffs Factory (Photo: KCNA-Yonhap).

DPRK state media reported on 14 June (Friday) that DPRK official head of state Supreme People’s Assembly [SPA] Presidium President Kim Yong Nam and “officials of the working people’s organizations, ministries and national institutions” visited the Pyongyang Essential Foodstuff Factory in east Pyongyang.  The food factory was recently visited by DPRK leader Kim Jong Un (Kim Cho’ng-u’n), reported on 7 June, and DPRK Cabinet Premier Pak Pong Ju, reported on 13 June.  KCNA reported that the factory “has turned into a modern essential foodstuff production base all the production processes of which have been automatized ranging from feeding of raw material to packing, a factory which has established a high level of cultured practice in production and life.”

SPA Presidium President Kim Yong Nam (1), the DPRK’s head of state, is briefed about food production touring a visit by senior DPRK officials. Also seen in attendance is SPA Presidium Vice President Yang Hyong Sop (2) and DPRK Vice Premier Kang Sok Ju (3) (Photo: KCNA-Yonhap).

Kim Yong Nam and the other senior officials began their visit by delivering flowers and bowing to a mosaic of late DPRK President and founder Kim Il Sung and late DPRK leader Kim Jong Il visiting the factory.  They toured the factory and watched a video “being briefed on the founding of the factory and its development, leadership feats performed by the great Generalissimos Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il and Marshal Kim Jong Un and the history of the development of the factory at the room dedicated to its history,” according to KCNA.  The group toured the factory’s amenities and service centers for employees such as its childcare facility, cultural center, public baths, swimming pool and resource libraries.  Whilst “seeing the production processes whose automation and robotization have been placed on a high level including the general control room, refined table oil, seasoning, refined salt and vitamin E and their packing processes,” Kim Yong Nam and the other senior officials “deeply grasped the patriotic intention of Kim Jong Un on accelerating the modernization of the factory by the DPRK’s efforts and technology,” according to KCNA.

SPA Presidium President Kim Yong Nam and other senior DPRK government officials tour a childcare classroom at Pyongyang Essential Foodstuffs Factory (Photo: KCNA-Yonhap).

DPRK nominal head of state Kim Yong Nam and other senior DPRK officials view an employees’ swimming pool at Pyongyang Essential Foodstuffs Factory (Photo: KCNA-Yonhap).

SPA Presidium President Kim Yong Nam and other senior DPRK officials tour Pyongyang Essential Foodstuffs Factory (Photo: KCNA-Yonhap).

DPRK Cabinet Premier Pak Pong Ju (3rd R) inspects a lawn mower during his visit to the renovation of Yanggakdo Stadium in Pyongyang. Also in attendance is DPRK Vice Premier and State Planning Commission Chairman Ro To Chol (2nd R) (Photo: Rodong Sinmun).

DPRK state media reported on 13 June (Thursday) that DPRK Cabinet Premier Pak Pong Ju visited the Pyongyang Essential Foodstuffs Factory and the renovation of the Yanggakdo Football Stadium.  Pak’s first visit was to the Pyongyang Essential Foodstuffs Factory, following up a visit by DPRK leader Kim Jong Un (Kim Cho’ng-u’n) which was reported in state media on 7 June.  Pak toured the food factory and “congratulated its officials and employees upon presenting a great pleasure to Kim Jong Un.”  He also convened a meeting with the factory’s managers and officials which “which stressed the need for the factory to activate the production on the basis of production potentiality. It also pressed for the measures for relevant units to substantially provide necessary raw and other materials.”  Pak later visited Yanggakdo Stadium, currently under going renovation work by construction units of the Ministry of Railways.  Pak “encouraged officials and employees of the Ministry of Railways all out in the drive to carry out the on-the-spot instructions given by the dear respected Marshal Kim Jong Un on successfully remodeling the stadium into an exclusive one that can represent football stadium of the DPRK” and “underscored the need for the officials and builders to keep in mind the undying exploits of President Kim Il Sung and leader Kim Jong Il for the development of the Chuch’e-oriented sports and bring about great innovations in remodeling the stadium,” according to KCNA.  Pak held a “consultative meeting” with construction managers and officials and “discussed the matters arising in sprucing up the stadium.”

View of Yanggakdo Stadium and the Pyongyang Essential Foodstuffs Factory (Photo: Google image).

The Pyongyang Essential Foodstuffs Factory in east Pyongyang (Photo: Google image).

The Yanggakdo Stadium in Pyongyang. Construction boats, some of which may be involved in dredging operations in the Taedong River to produce concrete, can be seen at the bottom of the image (Photo: Google image).