SEOUL • North Korea celebrated the 73rd anniversary of its foundation with a night-time military parade in the capital, state media reported yesterday, publishing photographs of marching rows of personnel in orange hazmat suits, but no ballistic missiles.
The most recent North Korean military parade came just before US President Joe Biden was inaugurated in January and showed off the latest developments in quick-strike, solid-fuel missiles that have been developed under Mr Kim Jong Un's leadership.
Mr Kim attended the night-time event as paramilitary and public security forces of the Worker-Peasant Red Guards, the country's largest civilian defence force, began marching in Pyongyang's Kim Il Sung Square at midnight on Wednesday, state media showed.
Rodong Sinmun, the ruling Workers' Party's newspaper, published photos of people in orange hazmat suits with medical-grade masks in an apparent symbol of anti-coronavirus efforts, and troops holding rifles marching together.
Some conventional weapons were also on display, including multiple rocket launchers and tractors carrying anti-tank missiles.
But no ballistic missiles were seen or mentioned in the reports, and Mr Kim did not deliver any speech, unlike last October when he boasted of the country's nuclear capabilities and showcased previously unseen intercontinental ballistic missiles during a pre-dawn military parade.
"The columns of emergency epidemic prevention and the Ministry of Public Health were full of patriotic enthusiasm to display the advantages of the socialist system all over the world, while firmly protecting the security of the country and its people from the worldwide pandemic," the Korean Central News Agency said.
Though the marchers wore hazmat suits, none of the thousands of people in the square had protective face masks in the photos and video distributed by state media.
State television broadcasts of the parade and other events showed Mr Kim closely surrounded by crowds of people reaching out to him to shake hands.
North Korea has not confirmed any Covid-19 cases. It has closed its borders and imposed strict prevention measures, seeing the pandemic as a matter of national survival.
It was the first time since 2013 that North Korea had staged a parade with the 5.7 million strong Worker-Peasant Red Guards, launched as reserve forces after the exit of Chinese forces who fought for the North in the 1950-53 Korean War.
The United States keeps around 28,500 soldiers in South Korea - a legacy of the Korean War which ended in an armistice, not a peace treaty, leaving the peninsula in a technical state of war.
President Biden's administration has said that it will explore diplomacy to achieve North Korean denuclearisation, but has shown no willingness to meet Pyongyang's demands for an easing of sanctions.
Talks aimed at persuading North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons and ballistic missile arsenals have stalled since 2019.
A reactivation of inter-Korean hotlines in July raised hopes for a restart of the denuclearisation talks. But the North stopped answering the calls as South Korea and the US held their annual military exercises last month, which Pyongyang has warned could trigger a security crisis.
Professor Yang Moo-jin at the University of North Korean Studies in Seoul said the perceived absence of strategic weapons at the parade and the focus on public security forces showed that Mr Kim is concentrating on domestic issues such as the coronavirus and the economy.
"The parade seems to be strictly designed as a domestic festival aimed at promoting national unity and solidarity of the regime," Prof Yang said.
"There were no nuclear weapons and Mr Kim didn't give a message while being there, which could be meant to keep the event low-key and leave room for manoeuvre for future talks with the United States and South Korea."
The fact that North Korea held a parade to celebrate the anniversary of the state's founding on what is considered a non-major anniversary year, "is unusual and underscores how much the country needed to bring the people together for a celebration and instil a sense of pride in them", said Ms Rachel Minyoung Lee, a non-resident fellow with the 38 North Programme at the Stimson Centre.
"Pyongyang clearly wants to keep its diplomatic options open for now, and that is why it toned down on the parade by making it a homeland security-centred parade rather than a military parade with big weapons," she said.
REUTERS, BLOOMBERG
