PYONGYANG, North Korea, Jan. 8 (UPI) -- North Korea has officially made a holiday out of the birthday of Kim Jong Un, one of North Korean leader Kim Jong Il's sons, North Korean defectors say.
The unnamed defectors said the North Korean government designated Jan. 8 a holiday in honor of the heir apparent to the North Korean leader, The Chosun Ilbo reported Wednesday.
"The secretariat of the North Korean Workers Party's Central Committee has sent instructions to nationwide party organizations to 'meaningfully commemorate Comrade Kim Jong Un's birthday,'" one of the sources said. "In the instructions, the secretariat stressed the need to formally designate Jan. 8 as a national day to celebrate Kim junior's birthday and called him 'our eternal future' and 'another leader who has perfectly inherited the Baekdu lineage.'"
The Ilbo said Kim Jong Il's Feb. 16 birthday was officially made a holiday in North Korea in 1975.
