DPRK to hold military parade to mark birthday of ruling party

PYONGYANG - The ruling party of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) has decided to stage a grand military parade to mark the 70th anniversary of its founding and the nation's liberation.

The political bureau of the Central Committee of the Workers' Party has passed a resolution on celebrations, reported the official KCNA news agency on Friday.

"We will hold in grand style a parade of the service personnel of the ground, naval, air and anti-aircraft and strategic forces of the Korean People's Army and a procession of Pyongyang citizens in celebration of the Party's 70th anniversary," reads the resolution passed on Tuesday.

"We will hold fast to the party's line of Songun (military-first) revolution so as to build up our national self-defense capability," it says.

The DPRK will produce larger numbers of powerful military equipment that are "of high precision, light, unmanned and intelligent" to cope with modern warfare, it says.

The DPRK will make vigorous effort to achieve national reunification and develop foreign relations "in a multilateral and proactive way," says the document.

On national economy, the resolution says "a major leap forward" will be made to accelerate economic development and defend socialism.

"We will open up a shortcut to building a knowledge-based economy ... and bring about a radical turn in improving people's standards of living by resolving the food problem of the people," it says, adding that crop farming, livestock raising and fisheries are three thrusts to address the issue.

Party discipline is also stressed in the resolution. "We will strengthen the party and ... establish stringent organizational discipline" so that the whole party can act as one under the leadership of Kim Jong Un, it says.

More construction will be completed this year, according to the resolution, including a sci-tech complex, Terminal 2 of Pyongyang International Airport and Building No.3 of Kim Il Sung University.