North Korea invites foreign dignitaries for ruling party's 80th anniversary celebrations

Foreign dignitaries have started arriving in North Korea ahead of celebrations to mark the 80th anniversary of the founding of its ruling Workers’ Party.

Kim Jong-un, the North Korean leader, has kept Friday’s commemoration plans under wraps, but South Korean officials have said they expect there will be a parade featuring the country’s latest military equipment.

The isolated nation, governed by the Kim family for the past three generations, counts Beijing and Moscow as its two closest allies, with Chinese Premier Li Qiang among those who arrived in the North Korean capital Pyongyang on Thursday.

The celebrations will also be attended by Russia's former President Dmitry Medvedev, Vietnam’s Communist Party General Secretary To Lam and Laos' President Thongloun Sisoulith.

Li, who is one of the seven members of China's Politburo, is the most senior Chinese official to visit North Korea since 2019. His trip comes after a series of high-level meetings between the two countries.

The Chinese and North Korean foreign ministers met in Beijing in late September, vowing to deepen bilateral ties and to push back against hegemonism, in what was a likely reference to the US.

At the start of September, Kim appeared beside Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin in Beijing at an enormous military parade to mark China's victory over Japan and the end of World War II.

During a bilateral meeting with Kim in the Chinese capital, Xi stressed the “great importance” of the two nations’ “traditional friendship”.

In a separate meeting between Kim and Putin in Beijing, the Russian leader thanked his North Korean ally for sending thousands of troops to help with its war against Ukraine.

“We will never forget the sacrifices made by your armed forces and the families of your military personnel,” Putin told Kim.

The Asian hermit state, which has been under significant international sanctions for years, has acted as one of Russia's biggest backers along with Iran in its ongoing all-out war against Ukraine, now in its fourth year.

It has lost at least 2,000 soldiers fighting for Moscow, according to South Korean intelligence reports from September.

Ahead of the 80th anniversary celebrations, Kim gave a speech on Wednesday at the Party Founding Museum in Pyongyang, in which he celebrated his grandfather and the state’s founder, Kim Il-sung, according to the state-run KCNA media agency.