editorial

A groundbreaking ceremony for the fifth-stage construction of the Hwasong area took place with splendour in Pyongyang on February 18.

The venue of the ceremony, which drew attention of the whole country, resounded with enthusiastic cheers of the participants.

It is because of the great significance of the construction project.

First, the point of the groundbreaking is truly phenomenal.

The groundbreaking ceremony was held only two days after the inauguration ceremony of the fourth-stage 10 000 flats in the Hwasong area which successfully completed the five-year plan for the capital city construction (2021-2025) set forth by the Eighth Congress of the Workers’ Party of Korea.

The WPK has made another gigantic step of creation for the people at a time when they were still thrilled at the miraculous reality in which nearly 60 000 flats had been built far exceeding the planned 50 000 flats in the last five years along with the recent inauguration of the new modern street.

The phrase “groundbreaking is precisely inauguration” has become a byword of the era and it has been regarded as a commonplace and natural thing that Pyongyang undergoes a great facelift each year. However, even before reviewing the successes achieved in the five-year struggle waged with persistent fortitude and enthusiasm, another construction campaign started to demonstrate once again the fighting stamina of the Party, which is making a dash for a higher goal and greater success without a moment’s delay or any self-complacency.

The commencement of the fifth-stage construction of the Hwasong area is also significant in that it marked the transition of the capital construction onto a new higher stage.

In fact, the appearance of Pyongyang has changed beyond recognition through the construction projects conducted in the past five years with the main emphasis on meeting the citizens’ demand for dwelling houses.

The urban quarters of the city have been extended eastward, westward and northward, and Songhwa Street with an 80-storey skyscraper as its symbolic building, Jonwi Street with an imposing tower-style skyscraper and the Hwasong area, which successfully combined formative and artistic qualities of architecture with modernity in different styles from the first to the fourth stage and broke new ground in all elements of architecture ranging from greening to lighting, have ushered in the golden age of Pyongyang in the new era.

From now on, the construction of the capital will make the transition onto a higher stage for drastically changing the overall appearance of the city, rather than forming one street after another.

It is the determination and will of the Party to build Pyongyang, the capital of the DPRK, into the most beautiful and greatest city in the world.

The first step was made in the Hwasong area, a symbol of the civilization of the times, which reflects the far-reaching ideal of the Party and provides a criterion to judge the level of the desired transformation.