Today's News

The 2026 Asian Weightlifting Championships took place in India last May.

The DPRK weightlifters bagged 30 medals including 18 golds and set 10-odd new world and Asian records at the championships which brought together over 170 excellent men and women weightlifters from more than 20 countries and regions.

In general, the competition begins with the matches of men’s 60kg and women’s 48kg categories each time as they are the men’s and women’s lowest weight categories. Therefore, the players of those categories are placed under considerable psychological pressure.

Nevertheless, Pang Un Chol won three gold medals in the men’s 60kg category by taking the first place in snatch and setting new world and Asian records in jerk.

And Ri Won Ju set new world and Asian records in jerk and total respectively in the men’s 71kg category.

What is noteworthy in the men’s events is that the DPRK players won championships in the heavyweight categories as well as in the lightweight ones.

In the men’s 79kg category, Ri Chong Song won a gold in snatch and silvers in jerk and total, and Ri Ryong Hyon set new world and Asian records in jerk and received golds in jerk and total and a silver in snatch. Thus, they took the first and second places respectively in the category.

Ro Kwang Ryol set new world and Asian records in jerk and a new Asian record in total to win two golds and one silver in the men’s 88kg category.

As a result, the men players of the DPRK indisputably topped the rankings in winning gold medals though they were smaller in number than other teams.

Meanwhile, the women players of the country fully displayed their ability.

Kim Il Gyong set a new Asian record in snatch and took the first place in jerk even without the third lift, thus winning three golds in the women’s 58kg category.

Ri Suk set new world and Asian records in jerk and total respectively in the women’s 63kg category to win the best player award of the championships. Song Kuk Hyang, who had set three new world records at the 2025 IWF World Championships to cause a sensation, established new world and Asian records in the recent competition, too.

After watching the lifts of the DPRK weightlifters, many experts expressed their astonishment at the team’s renewing world and Asian records each time.

The president of the International Weightlifting Federation said that the DPRK is maintaining its undeniable position of a weightlifting power in the international games, expressing his conviction that its players will continue to achieve signal successes and thus fly the venerable flag of the country more often.

The secretary general of the Asian Weightlifting Federation lavished praise on the DPRK men players, saying that he realized the men’s weightlifting of the country is rapidly developing as he witnessed them renewing many world records.