By Paddy Colligan
March 19, 2026

The Workers’ Party of Korea (WPK) convened its Ninth Party Congress on Feb. 19 in Pyongyang, the capital of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK). Over the next week, the 5,000 delegates to the Congress reviewed the work of the WPK from the preceding five years and discussed plans for the next five years. The proceedings of the Ninth Congress of the WPK are a matter of interest to the world.

Members were elected to national and provincial WPK leadership bodies. Commanding officers of the Korean People’s Army were appointed. Kim Jong Un, who was re-elected Secretary General of the WPK, made an introductory presentation and a closing address.

Kim Jong Un, who is also the President of the State Affairs Commission of the DPRK, described the Congress as having “drawn great interest at home and abroad, as it was convened in a period when our socialist construction is being pushed ahead … vigorously” in the midst of a “global political situation [that] is experiencing serious and rapid change.”

The DPRK, with a population of about 26 million, is situated on the northern part of the Korean peninsula. It shares its southern border with the Republic of Korea (ROK), with a population about 52 million.

From 1950 to 1953 Korea was engulfed in a brutal and bitter war. U.S. imperialism and its allies backed puppet forces in the southern part of the peninsula. The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) and China fought on the side of the DPRK. There has yet to be a treaty officially ending the war; a Demilitarized Zone — the DMZ — demarcates a tense border between the DPRK and the Republic of Korea.

Families still divided

Hundreds of thousands of families are painfully divided by the border and remain unable to visit or even maintain contact. Reunification was long a goal of the DPRK, of many political groups in the ROK and millions of Koreans on both sides of the border and in the diaspora.

In the last five years, however, a significant political shift occurred. This was reviewed by the Ninth Congress and summed up by Kim Jong Un as putting an end to the policy of seeking reconciliation and reunification. The Report of the Congress explained the “switchover in its line towards the ROK” in the following way:

“During the period under review, the WPK put a historic end to the abnormal relations with the ROK, which had existed on the Korean peninsula for nearly 80 years since the founding of the DPRK, and made a final crucial decision to define these relations as the most hostile state-to-state relationship and clarified the invariable principled stand of our Party and government.”

Noting violations of airspace and other hostile acts, the Report on the Ninth Congress continued its assessment of relations between the two countries on the peninsula:

“From the very beginning, the successive ruling forces of the ROK did not want genuine reconciliation and unity with us, but have worked hard to spread their culture within our country by abusing the opportunities for reconciliation and cooperation in a sinister attempt to bring about its change and the final collapse of its social system. …

The Report continues: “The ROK’s ultimate ambition is to turn the whole Korean peninsula into … one under the capitalist reactionary system of ‘liberal democracy.’ While outwardly advocating deceptive ‘reconciliation’ and ‘peace,’ it is seeking to disarm the DPRK under the signboard of the ‘denuclearization of the Korean peninsula.’”

The Report discussed development projects that were carried out during the previous five-year period and are planned for the future as well. Socialist construction projects prioritize improvements in living conditions that “clearly show the advantages of the socialist system in our country, which attaches importance to the popular and people-oriented ones, and prove the truth and vitality of our Party’s people-first politics.”

There is an ongoing focus on increasing and improving housing and implementing a new child care policy to provide children with dairy products and nutritious food every day. There are plans to improve education and modernize conditions in rural areas “where centuries-old backwardness lingered.”

The national economic plan includes clarifying production goals and applying scientific methods to developing agriculture production, growing vegetables in greenhouses, fish farming, sea culture, mining and sustainable management of natural resources and land. The Report also suggests that there are plans for developing the information technology, artificial intelligence, space and tourism industries and external trade.

In addition to socialist construction and improving people’s lives, the WPK is concerned about party building, which is explained as the desire to “further develop our Party into the general staff of the revolution with a high leadership position and guiding ability.” Ideological understanding, “voluntarily observing discipline” and “building a good working manner” are goals.

The DPRK views its development and possession of nuclear weapons as an essential right. The Ninth Congress Report states that the Constitution of the DPRK takes the position that its nuclear arsenal is necessary to “ensure the country’s rights to existence and development, deter war and defend regional and global peace and stability by rapidly developing its nuclear weapons.” It must continue to be “a full-fledged nuclear state.”

The DPRK is committed also to turn its armed forces into the strongest army in the world, including politically and ideologically. Nuclear weapons are the “legitimate defense pertaining to our right to self-defense,” and the DPRK will continue to bolster its nuclear force “as long as nuclear weapons exist on the earth, and the U.S. imperialists and their followers remain unchanged in their moves against the DPRK.”

World plunged into ‘chaos and upheaval’

Kim Jong Un analyzed the “great changes that took place in the international political and security structure, balance of forces and trend of the situation during the period under review,” according to the report. It is “completely different from the one five years ago, and international relations have been plunged into the vortex of chaos and upheaval.”

The Report continues describing the aggression, “the infringement of state sovereignty, wanton violation of international law, the global security crisis … the political and economic chaos and disorder in different countries” that characterize today’s world.

The world situation as described in the report from the WPK Ninth Congress could be copied from today’s headlines and news analysis. And in this context, France24 reported on March 12 that the DPRK test fired rockets from several missile systems — coinciding with joint U.S.-South Korea military exercises. With a touch of irony, Japan and the ROK claim concerns about regional security.

“The Report on the Ninth Congress of the Workers’ Party of Korea,” Feb. 26, 2026, and “Respected Comrade Kim Jong Un’s Closing Address at the Ninth WPK Congress,” both online at KCNA.kp, Feb. 26, 2026.