North Korean pop band leaves Beijing without performing: Kyodo

An all-female North Korean pop band formed by leader Kim Jong Un abruptly cancelled a Beijing concert on Saturday and headed back home to Pyongyang, Chinese media and the concert venue said.

Cheong has said that Kim Jong Un has banned all the dancing and singing during he mourning period, resulting in the sudden cancellation of band’s concert in Beijing.

The concerts scheduled for three days through Monday by members of the Moranbong Band and the North’s State Merited Chorus were widely seen as the latest sign of warming relations between the two traditional allies.

However, band members arrived at Beijing’s airport in North Korean Embassy vehicles on Saturday afternoon, and departed aboard a North Korean Air Koryo jet shortly after 4 p.m. following a lengthy delay, Chinese news website sina.com reported.

Now the reunions are being held less than once a year and with only a very limited number of participants – despite a huge waiting list of largely elderly South Koreans desperate to see their relatives in the North before they die.

Insiders at the Giant Egg, as the theater is colloquially referred to, say stage setup for the Moranbong concerts has already been demolished.

The centre later in the day announced the cancellation of all three joint concerts by the band and chorus. They were not open to the public and were invitation-only.

Last Friday, North Korea’s official KCNA news agency lauded the attention the band’s arrival in China was drawing, saying world media “vie with each other to report about the China visit”.

Relations appeared to be on the mend following a well-publicized visit to Pyongyang by high-ranking Chinese official Liu Yunshan in October.

Cheong said that this event won’t degrade North Korea’s relationship with China greatly, but will certainly deepen Chinese decision-makers’ distrust toward North Korea.

Since becoming China’s president in March 2013, Xi Jinping has never met with Kim.

Its members play a range of instruments, including electronic violins.

The singers and the musicians, sometimes wearing skirts cut well above the knee, are known for fancy dance steps and their performances have been considered modern and seductive by North Korean standards.

For the second time in as many weeks, a former top NY politician was convicted on federal corruption charges, prompting calls for tougher ethics rules and threatening to further undermine citizens’ trust in their…

Nonetheless, they mostly play numbers explicitly or implicitly praising Kim’s regime and the ruling Workers’ Party of Korea.