Editor selections from Asia

On Monday South Korea’s Unification Ministry Spokesman Jeong Joon-hee said Pyongyang showed a few restraint during the celebration of the 70th anniversary of the founding of North Korea’s ruling party.

Kim, clad in black, walked down a red carpet and saluted his guard of honour.

During his stay, Liu paid a visit to the Kumsusan Palace of the Sun and presented floral baskets to the statues of late top DPRK leaders Kim II Sung and Kim Jong II. Kim smiled as he spoke with Liu through an interpreter.

North Korea put on a huge military parade on Saturday to celebrate the 70th anniversary of the ruling Workers’ Party.

The USA government has acknowledged North Korea’s capability to launch long-range nuclear missiles that could reach the United States, but stressed that the Pentagon is adequately prepared for such a possibility.

A few were crying. a few were screaming his name and saying, “Long live Kim Jong Un!”

An aircraft flypast forming the number 70 flew over the square.

The North also showed off diverse advanced weapons, including KN-08 intercontinental ballistic missiles and new 300-millimeter rocket launchers.

USA officials, however, have cast doubt on this claim and experts say it is hard to assess the progress North Korea has made on miniaturisation.

The guest list is shaping up to be less impressive.

No world leaders were attending, but China sent a senior Communist Party official.

The celebrations continued, after a downpour of rain, with an evening torchlight parade which thousands of Pyongyang citizens have been seen practising for in public squares across the city.

The finale was a concert on a special stage set up on a river running through central Pyongyang.

On Friday, senior state officials led a mass gathering in Pyongyang singing the praises of the party and the leader.

Kim’s weight increased significantly in June, with pictures of him released by the official North Korean news agency showing a much heftier man than the one who ascended to power in 2011.

“As our party has spared nothing for young people, our country is now greeting a fresh heyday in the youth movement and is demonstrating its might as the one and only great youth power, in which the youth problem has been solved perfectly”, Kim Jong Un said on Saturday. By omitting any specific mention of the South, Kim was picking up where he left off with remarks about the agreement during an extended meeting of the Workers’ Party central military commission on August. 28, analysts said.

Kim, for his part, said that North Korea was working to develop its economy and the lives of its people, and needs a peaceful and stable external environment to achieve these goals.

An exhaustively researched report published this week by the US-based Institute for Science and global Security estimated that North Korea had between 10 and 16 nuclear bombs as of the end of 2014.