North Korea ruling party continues plenary session for 3rd day

By Riyaz ul Khaliq ​​​​​​​

ISTANBUL (AA) - North Korea's ruling Workers Party continued its plenary session for the third day, the state media reported on Monday.

The enlarged meeting of the 10th plenary session of the eighth central committee of the Workers' Party of Korea continued on Sunday, KCNA reported.

The plenary session, which reviews the six-month progress, has been held since Friday in what appears to be the mountainous Myohyangsan region in the northwest of the country, according to an analysis of photos released to the state media.

The participating party members were also seen wearing for the first time a pin featuring the portrait of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, who also attended the meeting.

Leading officials of the party held “sectional consultative meetings to work out detailed and practical measures for successfully fulfilling” and “thoroughly exploring the ways for carrying out the tasks” for the second half of the current year.

It is the first meeting since Russian President Vladimir Putin visited Pyongyang in June and the party members are expected to discuss a comprehensive strategic partnership treaty signed with Moscow, under which the two sides vowed to provide each other military assistance "without delay" if either is attacked by a third country.

The meeting is being held amid an intense security situation on the Korean Peninsula which saw trilateral all-domain military exercises by the US, Japan, and South Korea last week.

Pyongyang also launched two ballistic missiles on Monday and vowed to protect its sovereignty, slamming the trilateral drills as the “Asian version of NATO.”