Kim Jong-un, the communist dictator of North Korea, participated in an inauguration ceremony on Sunday for an apartment neighborhood complex built in the nation’s capital for the families of soldiers killed aiding Russia in its ongoing invasion of Ukraine.
The Korean Central News Agency (KCNA), the regime’s flagship state news agency, published photos of Kim and his daughter embracing families of fallen soldiers and addressing a ceremony at the apartment block, apparently built in an otherwise undeveloped empty space in Pyongyang next to a reservoir. The presence of his daughter, believed to be named Kim Ju-ae based on information from former basketball star Dennis Rodman, followed reports last week that the dictator had begun the process of formally training her to succeed him as communist tyrant. Kim Ju-ae is believed to be about 12 years old.
The development of new housing in Pyongyang for the families of veterans is notable as the Kim regime has traditionally been extremely strict regarding who it allows to live where in the country. Under a caste system known as songbun, every North Korean is ranked by their loyalty to communism. The nation’s wealthiest elite and children of communists are allowed to live in Pyongyang, while those considered of lukewarm support to the party are banned from Pyongyang and forced to live in the impoverished countryside. Families considered hostile to communism, due to either political convictions or being suspected of Christianity, are forced into labor camps for generations. The Kim regime appears to be presenting the death of a soldier in the family fighting for Russia in the Ukraine invasion as a fast-track to high songbun.
According to KCNA, the new complex, named Saeppyol (“New Star”) Street, is a “monumental architectural complex with a young heart” built “to convey the star-shining majesty of the heroes who participated in overseas military operations.” The inauguration of the complex on Sunday first featured personal greetings from Kim and his daughter to the families of those killed, including parents and children, as well as a speech by the dictator.
“The Party and the government will take all necessary steps to ensure that these families lead a proud and worthwhile life while enjoying the preferential treatment by the state and the loving care of the whole society,” Kim promised in his address.
Kim credited the construction to “the ardent desire of our motherland that wishes that the precious lives of its excellent sons, who defended the most sacred things by sacrificing their most valuable things, will live forever.” The neighborhood, he asserted, was a “source of honor for our generation and a pride of Pyongyang.”
The government of Russia under dictator Vladimir Putin first invaded Ukraine in 2014, seizing its Crimean Peninsula. Putin escalated ongoing clashes in eastern Ukraine, fueled by “pro-Russian separatists,” to a full-scale Russian military invasion of the country in February 2022. North Korea became involved in the conflict after Putin visited Pyongyang in June 2024 and he and Kim signed a “mutual defense agreement” that obligated each country to use its military if the other is attacked.
The North Korean government first revealed its involvement in the war in April 2025. The Kim regime claimed at the time, and still does, that its soldiers are not fighting inside Ukraine, but aiding Russia in Kursk, an uncontested region of Russia that Ukraine counter-invaded in 2024. Since that revelation, multiple governments have confirmed the presence of thousands of North Koreans fighting on the European continent. The government of Ukraine published videos of alleged North Korean soldiers captured in battle in January 2025, prior to Kim confirming that he had deployed them.
“Ukraine is ready to hand over Kim Jong Un’s soldiers to him if he can organize their exchange for our warriors who are being held captive in Russia,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky offered at the time. “For those North Korean soldiers who do not wish to return, there may be other options available. In particular, those who express a desire to bring peace closer by spreading the truth about this war in Korean will be given that opportunity.”
In December, Kim Jong-un organized an event to honor North Koreans allegedly killed in mine-clearing operations in Kursk, calling them “courageous and responsible all the time” and promising to support their families.
“Early in August you, engineers of the regiment, left for the Kursk region of the Russian Federation, which your comrades-in-arms had retaken at the cost of their lives, and you achieved brilliant results in the course of performing your combat tasks there,” Kim said during a ceremony to honor the killed soldiers.
Shortly after that ceremony, Putin made public remarks also thanking North Korea, stating that its soldiers had “fought valiantly and bravely with the enemy side-by-side with Russian soldiers” – a slightly different testimony than Kim’s claim that the North Koreans were engaging in mine-clearing and engineering operations, though Putin also acknowledged that work.
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