President KIM IL SUNG Great champion of Korea's independent reunification-special article by Dr Dermot Hudson

                                                                 

President KIM IL SUNG who passed away 26 years ago on the 8th of July , was a great champion of the independent reunification of Korea . In fact  just before he passed away President KIM IL SUNG had been working on a document for the reunification of Korea and planned to hold a summit with the south Korean chief executive . At Panmunjom you can see the monument with the signature of President KIM IL SUNG dated 7th of July 1994.
                                           

  When Korea was divided by the US imperialists in 1945 President KIM IL SUNG was deeply pained by it . During the years of the anti-Japanese armed struggle he had fought for the independence of the whole country , all of Korea , not just one part of it . However two US army colonels one of them being Dean Rusk had taken a pencil and a ruler and drawn a line across a map of Korea and the US army stole into south Korea a few weeks after the liberation of Korea and established brutal US military rule in south Korea dissolving the people's committees and banning the Communist Party in south Korea .Later the US imperialists swapped direct US military rule with a puppet regime . However comrade KIM IL SUNG was determined to prevent the permanent division of Korea , he saw it as  grave crime and struggled against it . He urged the south Korean people to struggle against the US occupation of south Korea and met south Korean communists such as Ho Hon and also progressive and leftist figures such as Ryu Un Hyong(who was later murdered by the US imperialists ) .
  Comrade KIM IL SUNG put forward the line of creating a unified central government and the line of founding a democratic people' republic for the whole of Korea .
                           

  In April 1948 he called a conference of politicians , public figures and activists  from both north Korea and south Korea . The conference met on Ssuk Island on the Taedong River in Pyongyang  and became known as the April Joint Conference . It was attended by not only left wing figures from south Korea but also middle of the road figures and even right wing figures from south Korea . Comrade KIM IL SUNG showed great magnanimity and broad-mindedness towards right wing nationalists such as Kim Gu who had been anti-communist all his life but after meeting President KIM IL SUNG resolved to instead work with communists (he too was also murdered by the US imperialists ) . Thus when the DPRK was founded in September 1948 it represented the whole of Korea and all Korean people and is the only legitimate state on the Korean peninsula.
  In the run-up to the outbreak of the Fatherland Liberation War (known as the Korean war in the West )  President KIM IL SUNG  put forward many proposals for peaceful reunification . On the 7th of June  1950the Democratic Front for the Reunification adopted the  "appeal for promoting measures for the peaceful reunification of the fatherland". The appeal proposed to hold a general election throughout north and south Korea from August 5 to 8, 1950 and establish a united independent democratic central government by forming a united supreme legislative body. To discuss the question of the establishment of a central guidance committee for this general election, the appeal also proposed to convene a consultative meeting of the representatives of north and south Korean political parties and social organizations in Haeju or Kaesong between June 15 and 17. On June 11 3 emissaries from the DPRK went to south Korea to convey the proposals  but were arrested by the fascist Syngham Rhee puppet regime . On June 19th the DPRK proposed to merge the DPRK Supreme People's Assembly with the south Korea 'National Assembly' but to no avail.
    When the south Korean puppets and their US imperialist masters attacked the DPRK on the 25th of June 1950 the DPRK counter-attacked and by August had successfully liberated 90 per cent of the territory of south Korea and 92 per cent of the population . Thus for a few months in 1950 the Korean people enjoyed reunification , however this was ruined by the massive intervention of the US imperialists and 15 of their satellite states.
    After the war President KIM IL SUNG put forward countless proposals for reunification and not only that also offered to send food and other materials to south Korea , to provide jobless south Korena people with jobs in the DPRK and free education to south Korean students . In 1960 President
KIM IL SUNG put forward the idea of a Confederation of north and south Korea as a transitional measure . At the same time he encouraged the south Korean people in their anti US independence struggle .
 At the 8th Plenary Meeting of the 4th Central Committee of the WPK in February 1964, President KIM IL SUNG advanced the outstanding policy on strengthening in every way the three forces for national reunification-- the revolutionary forces in the northern half of Korea, the revolutionary forces in south Korea and the international revolutionary forces. He gave great encouragement to the south Korean revolutionaries and took care of them.
  In 1972 President KIM IL SUNG held talks with south Korean representatives . It was hard for him to do so because of the record of the south Korean puppet regime but he took the line of not taking issue with their past records so long as they supported independent, peaceful reunification .  On July 4th 1972 the north -south joint statement was published which stipulated that Korea should be reunified independently and peacefully and on the basis of unity. He also wisely led the struggle to put into practice the July 4 joint statement and thus prevent the permanent division of the nation and put the national reunification movement on a new stage.
       At the historic 6th Congress of the WPK in October 1980,  President KIM IL SUNG advanced the proposal for founding the Democratic Federal Republic of Koryo and wisely led the struggle for putting it into practice, thereby opening up a wide avenue for the independent and peaceful reunification of the country.
  In 1984 when south Korea was badly hit by floods President KIM IL SUNG made sure that the DPRK sent food , fabrics , medicines and cement to south Korea.
     In the 1990s President KIM IL SUNG met with a number of south Korean and overseas figures  such as the Rev Moon Ik Hwan .He published many works on independent national reunification  such as " Let  Us Achieve  the  great  unity of  our nation '
 At the 5th Session of the 9th Supreme People's Assembly in April 1993,  President KIM IL SUNG announced the  "10-Point Programme of the Great Unity of the Whole Nation for the Reunification of the Country", thus opening up a new chapter for the great national unity. He worked hard to the very last moments of his life to put this programme into action .
   President KIM IL SUNG is remembered for many things but his work for independent reunification stands out . Today is carried forward by dear respected Marshal KIM JONG UN