Kim Jong-un camp followers to cavort with Manhattan’s Marxists… US Juche jamboree, part Comintern, part bombintern
The Ureuk Symphony Orchestra performing Footsteps, a song dedicated to Kim Jong-un, at Merkin Concert Hall in New York City in February 2012. (YouTube screengrab)
For anyone seeking insight into the nature and scope of the pro-North Korea movement in the United States, an opportunity is just about to arise.
The Riverside Church in New York City, host to radical events for decades, will host a major conference of pro-North Korea and terrorism supporting groups and activists from July 25 through July 27 with participants from across the U.S. and around the world.
Everyone who is anyone in the pro-North Korea movement will be there. The sponsoring, organizing, and participating groups and speakers constitute a “who’s who” of pro-North forces.
In addition, pursuant to “intersectionality,” many pro-terrorism groups and activists, including those supportive of Hamas will attend, as well as several communist parties and groups representing a variety of not only Kimilsungist, but also Marxist, Leninist, Stalinist, Trotskyist, Maoist, Castroist, and Hoxhaist perspectives.
This rogue’s gallery of extremism, the fringe of a fringe, will be the largest gathering of hardcore pro-North groups and activists since an ad hoc group called the Korea Truth Commission in June 2001 held a Korea International War Crimes Tribunal in New York City to blame the U.S. for starting the Korean War. Some of the same pro-North groups and activists who organized and participated in that event will now be involved in the conference. The years pass, but the hatred for America remains.
The People’s Summit for Korea, as it is being called, will focus on defending North Korea while calling for the “liberation” of South Korea, with copious doses of anti-Americanism.
It will include advocates for Hamas and the communist New People’s Army rebels of the Philippines, both of which have murdered Americans and are designated by Washington as terrorist organizations.
Supporters of other communist, jihadist, and dictatorial regimes such as China, Iran, Cuba, and Venezuela will also participate. This jamboree of Juche fans will thus be part Comintern and part Bombintern, a kind of 21st century Woodstock for cheerleaders for totalitarianism, repression, and terrorism.
As for the timing, pro-North forces in the U.S. and elsewhere often hold events or conduct congressional lobbying campaigns in late June or late July, to coincide with North Korea’s annual “Month of Anti-American Struggle.”
Another major reason for the event at this time, and the explanation as to why so many pro-North groups and activists are involved, has to do with the strategic decision by Kim Jong-un in late 2023 and early 2024. When Kim announced and began to implement his new policy discarding a longstanding policy emphasis on the reunification of Korea, the result was confusion among pro-North forces in both South Korea and the U.S., since the policy shift had not been explained in advance. Pro-North groups and activists were taken by surprise. But those in the U.S. and South Korea followed the North’s dictates by revising their rhetoric and changing the names of their organizations to comport with the change of direction.
Some longtime leaders of pro-North groups who were associated with the North’s previous unification policy obediently stepped down to make way for new chiefs, and in a few cases, groups closely affiliated with the old policy were urged to disband. Nevertheless, a sense of unease and confusion remains among pro-North activists as to how to proceed in promoting the cause.
It is therefore highly likely that the conference is being held now to further explain and ensure correct understanding of and full compliance with the North’s new policy which characterizes South Korea as a hostile state and discourages the reunification-related rhetoric of the past. This is not speculation, as some hardcore pro-North figures have hinted at this need for increased coordination under the new policy of Kim.
Although several past and present leaders and members of the groups directly involved in this conference, such as Nodutdol and Women Cross DMZ, have for many years been communicating, meeting, and collaborating on political influence projects with North Korean intelligence agents based at the North’s Mission to the United Nations, there is another foreign force which may also be present behind the scenes.
Groups listed as “convening” or “supporting” the event, such as Code Pink, The People’s Forum, ANSWER Coalition (a front group of the communist Party for Socialism and Liberation) have been under investigation by Congress and the subject of media investigative reports for their alleged connection to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), via a funding and political influence network operated by radical billionaire Neville Roy Singham.
Based in Shanghai and married to a co-founder and co-leader of Code Pink, Singham, according to those reports and investigations (and allegedly through him the CCP) has been generously supporting these groups. The Congressional investigations, which are seeking testimony from groups and individuals involved, will not conclude by the time of the conference, but it appears that Singham’s network may play a significant role in the event via its funded organizations.
It is possible that New York mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani may stop by. He is a proud member of the Marxist Democratic Socialists of America, which is a “supporting organization” of the event, and was endorsed by a co-founder of the fanatically pro-North group Nodutdol, which is a “convening organization.” He may seek votes from his natural allies, who may put aside their distaste for “bourgeois elections” to vote for a comrade who, like them, has impeccable anti-Israel qualifications. Even if sourced from members of extremist groups which have praised terrorist murders, called for the overthrow of South Korea, urged the destruction of Israel, and endorsed the abolition of the U.S., a vote is a vote.
As for those coming from overseas for this festival of hate, no doubt the relevant authorities will exercise their discretion to identify those whose presence would be detrimental for U.S. national security.
Lawrence Peck is a correspondent for NK Insider based in Seoul and Los Angeles. Having intensively researched and closely monitored the activities of pro-North Korea and other extremist groups and activists in the U.S. for over 25 years, he has been recognized in the U.S. and Korea as one of the leading American authorities on such topics, and has lectured, written extensively and been interviewed on such topics in the U.S. and Korea. He has a Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) and a Juris Doctor degree from Loyola Law School of Los Angeles. He previously worked in Korea for several of the largest Korean business groups in the fields of intellectual property licensing and international business development. He also serves as an advisor to the North Korea Freedom Coalition of the U.S. Lawrence may be reached at the email address: lawrence.nkinsider@gmail.com
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