p May 5, 1993

p I, on behalf of the Central Committee of the Workers’ Party of Korea and on my own, offer warm felicitations to the International Seminar of the Communist and Workers’ Parties on the Present Situation and the Validity of Marxism which gets underway on the occasion of the 175th birthday of Karl Marx and to the delegates of the Communist and the Workers’ Parties of various countries to the Seminar.

p Karl Marx, an outstanding leader of the international working class, gave birth to Marxism to provide the working class with a powerful ideological and theoretical weapon for the liberation struggle and blazed a trail to the international communist movement, and his name remains deeply engraved in the minds of the progressive contemporaries for the enormous exploits he performed in the cause of human emancipation.

p The unheard of intensity of the abuses and offensive against socialism and communism, the ideals of Marxism, on the part of the imperialists and reactionaries renders the international seminar on the Validity of Marxism all the more timely and important.

p The Communist and Workers’ Parties and the world progressive people are now faced with a pressing task to champion the Marxist idea, the ideals of socialism, in the face of the counter revolutionary offensive by the imperialists and all other reactionaries, to advance more vigorously the socialist movement and to further consolidate the ties of international unity and solidarity based on independence and equality.

p I expect that your Seminar will focus on the effective exchange of experience and views in a bid to defend and advance the cause of Marxism, the socialist and communist cause, so as to greatly spur the progressive people onto further struggle for the socialist cause against imperialism.

Workers Party of Korea