By Brendan Clementz

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un says that he wishes to tear down a monument dedicated to the two clashing countries of Korea and their eventual reunion.

In a recent public assembly in Pyongyang, Kim stated that the North was discontinuing a policy made to try to reunify with South Korea, and also said that the North would be sending out more spy satellites in 2024. 

In the same assembly, Kim mentioned a monument that his late father built in the same city of Pyongyang. Known as the Monument to the Three Charters for National Reunification, he took a shortcut and instead referred to it as an “eyesore” and said that he was going to tear it down. 

The structure’s call for a peaceful resolution to the divided countries doesn’t align with his recent rhetoric, portraying the South Koreans as the enemy to the North. This is only one of the many sweeping motions he is making against the idea of peace, also abolishing three departments made to cooperate with South Korea. 

On the subject of a tentative war, Kim said that “[we do] not want war, but we have no intention of avoiding it.”