North Korea

Many of my students know that I find North Korea fascinating—it is gruesomely interesting. I periodically check in on its official news agency because it’s so bizarre. You don’t see North Korea-Latin America connections very often, but yesterday the North Korean government stressed that Brazil is appreciative of how Kim Jong Il is working to “revive socialism.”

Kim Jong Il Highly Praised in Brazil

Pyongyang, February 12 (KCNA) -- The Brazil-Korea Friendship Association published a special issue of information bulletin titled "General Kim Jong Il, Great Defender of Socialist Cause" on Feb. 3 on the occasion of the February holiday. The bulletin said in an article that leader Kim Jong Il authored famous works "The Historical Lesson in Building Socialism and the General Line of Our Party" and "Socialism Is a Science", providing ideological and theoretical guidelines for upholding the socialist idea and reviving socialism. It noted that the Pyongyang Declaration "Let Us Defend and Advance the Socialist Cause" adopted in April, 1992 was a historical document that saved the world socialist movement and put it on a new road of development. Kim Jong Il decisively frustrated the vicious moves of the U.S. to destroy socialism and isolate and stifle the DPRK and firmly defended its socialism with his Songun politics, showing with a practical example which way the countries and peoples aspiring after socialism should follow to defend socialism, it stressed.