North Korean leader slams 'irresponsible' officials as typhoon hits country

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un lashed out at "irresponsible" officials for failing to prevent damage from typhoon Khanun that swept through the Korean peninsula last week, the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported.

According to the state media, the North Korean leader inspected the typhoon-hit areas in Ogye-ri, Anbyon County of Kangwon Province and guided the recovery work and said that the floods in Ogye-ri of Anbyon County were entirely due to extremely chronic and irresponsible work attitude of officials.

He pointed out that 200-odd hectares of farmlands in Ogye-ri of Anbyon County were flooded, entirely due to the extremely chronic and irresponsible work attitude of agricultural guidance organs and Party organizations in the region.

The Party has strongly called upon all sectors and units to take decisive steps for strengthening the anti-damage measure and counter-crisis capability while making the occurrence of natural disasters every year a fait accompli and continued the work for assigning relevant instructions, but the officials of the region were insensitive to the state measures and took no measure and, as a result, the region suffered much damage than other regions, he noted, saying that a warning should be given to the state work system for having the capability to prevent natural disasters once again with this opportunity as an occasion.

He stressed the need for all regions and units to quickly find out dangerous locations and take measures for preventing damage in advance, as per KCNA.

Typhoon Khanun, which had affected Japan before taking a circuitous route towards the Korean peninsula, moved across North Korea early Friday bringing heavy rains to the South.

According to KCNA, after the outbreak of typhoon damage, Kim saw to it that senior officials of the Party and the government went to the spots to learn in detail about the damage and pushed ahead with the recovery work. And he urged the Korean People's Army (KPA) units stationed in Kangwon Province to launch a campaign for rapid recovery from the damage by urgently deploying necessary forces.

Highly appreciating the KPA units which promptly went to work for recovering farmlands from flood damage, displaying their militant might, he said that the army should be able to actively cope with the war and other sudden non-military tasks, including the recovery from disasters and perfectly perform its duty. It is the duty and absolute mission of the KPA to defend the life and security of the people at the risk of their life in any crisis, he added.

Saying that as the flooded farmlands were rehabilitated in a short span of time, it is quite possible to prevent the aftermath of damage, he gave instruction on taking necessary agro-technical measures including immediate nutrition management for protecting crops to the maximum and preventing bad effects on grain output.