Kim officially defined suicide as an "act of treason against socialism" and issued a confidential suicide prevention order during emergency meetings of the party leaders all over the country, Radio Free Asia (RFA) reported on June 5.

An unnamed official from North Hamgyong told RFA that the details of suicide cases shared during the meeting shocked the gathered officials.

"Our meeting was held at the provincial party committee's building located in Pohang district, in the city of Chongjin," the unnamed official said.

He further added that "the large number of suicide cases in the province was revealed and some officials… could not hide their anxious expressions."

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"The goal is simply fraternity," he added.

A papal visit to the isolated country was floated in 2018 when Seoul's former president Moon Jae-in embarked on a round of diplomacy with Pyongyang's leader Kim Jong Un.

Moon, who is Catholic, said during a summit that Kim told him the pontiff would be "enthusiastically" welcomed.

Pope Francis replied at the time that he would be willing to go if he received an official invitation.

But Pyongyang has largely cut off contact with Seoul following the collapse of a second summit between Kim and then-US president Donald Trump in 2019, which has left talks at a standstill.

Relations between the two Koreas have remained frosty since the inauguration of new president Yoon Suk-yeol in May.

Yoon offered aid to the North in return for denuclearisation, but Kim's regime ridiculed the plan.

The North blamed South Korea for its May outbreak of Covid-19 and earlier this month threatened to "wipe out" Seoul's authorities in retaliation.

Pope Francis has repeatedly urged the people of North and South Korea to "work for peace".

"You, the Korean people, have suffered from the war," he said.

Religious freedom is enshrined in the North's constitution, but all religious activity is banned outside state-sanctioned institutions.

In the early 20th century before the division of the peninsula, Pyongyang was a regional missionary hub with scores of churches and a thriving Christian community that earned it the title "Jerusalem of the East".

But Kim Il Sung, the North's late founding leader and the current ruler's grandfather, viewed Christianity as a threat and eradicated it through executions and labour camps.

The North's regime has since allowed Catholic organisations to run aid projects, but direct relations with the Vatican are non-existent.

When Pope Francis visited South Korea in 2014, he held a special mass dedicated to the reunification of the two Koreas.

Sources

UCA News

RFI

From hypersonic to medium-range ballistic missiles, Pyongyang test-fired a string of weaponry in January. Then last week launched what it claimed was a component of a "reconnaissance satellite" - although Seoul described it as another ballistic missile.

Despite biting international sanctions over its nuclear weapons, Pyongyang has ignored US offers of talks since high-profile negotiations between leader Kim Jong Un and then-US president Donald Trump collapsed in 2019.

Instead of diplomacy, Pyongyang has doubled-down on Kim's drive to modernise its military, warning in January that it could abandon a self-imposed moratorium on testing long-range missiles and nuclear weapons.

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According to Pope Francis, speaking shortly after the meeting, it was an example of the "culture of encounter."

"In the last few hours we have witnessed a good example of the culture of encounter in Korea," Francis said Sunday.

"I greet the protagonists with the prayer that this significant gesture constitutes a further step on the path of peace. Not only on that peninsula but in favor of the whole world." Read more

According to NK News, some North Koreans have decided to give up alcohol for the duration of Kim's trip to Hanoi in order to demonstrate their loyalty. Continue reading

His invitation is seen as a gesture designed to highlight peace on the Korean peninsula.

South Korean President Moon Jae-in will relay Kim's desire to host a papal visit when he visits the Vatican later this month.

His visit will be to reaffirm the Vatican's "blessing and support for peace and stability of the Korean peninsula," according to a spokesperson for Moon.

A Vatican statement says it is "anticipating the invitation." Questions as to how the pope may react to the invitation, however, met with a "let's wait for the invitation to arrive" response.

Kim's invitation to the pope is at odds with many of his actions since he took office seven years ago.

He has been censured for North Korea's repeated nuclear tests, alleged human rights abuses and reports that he was responsible for ordering his uncle's and brother's executions.

More recently, he has sought to present a more open-minded, "jovial" image of a leader who is apparently keen to promote dialogue and work towards peace on the Korean Peninsula.

Moon is seen as being at least partly responsible for Kim's initiative.

At their third inter-Korean summit in Pyongyang in September, Moon was accompanied by Hyginus Kim Hee-joong, the Archbishop of Gwangju and president of the Catholic Bishops' Conference of Korea.

A source close to the matter revealed to La Croix that "he personally transmitted a message from the Pope to Kim Jong-un at the meeting, and Kim's reaction was quite positive."

According to a South Korean presidential spokesperson, "Kim said he wanted the Pope to know his desire for peace."

Source

• La Croix
• New York Times
• La Croix
• Image: Sky News

"The Panmunjom Declaration for Peace, Prosperity and Reunification on the Korean Peninsula is a historical event.

It "opens the era of reunification of the Korean peninsula and is a gospel of hope on this earth," Archbishop Kim Hee-Jung of Gwangju says.

North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un and South Korean President Moon Jae-In signed the Declaration.

In it they promise "there will be no more war on the Korean Peninsula and thus a new era of peace has begun."

The Declaration agrees to "complete denuclearisation [and] a nuclear-free Korean Peninsula."

The two leaders agreed to strive for a peace treaty to formally end the 1950-53 war, which was halted by an armistice.

The Declaration also binds the leaders to involving China and the United States in negotiations to formally end the war.

Archbishop Kim says he expects "the fruits of this inter-Korean summit [at which the Declaration was signed], which God has made in response to our prayers and efforts, will be more energised by the unification ministry and private exchanges that the Korean Catholic Church has promoted during that time."

In the Declaration the leaders promise to undertake increased exchanges, visits, and cooperation between the North and South.

This aims to promote a sense of unity and to enable families separated during the Korean War to reunify.

Archbishop Kim says the Catholic Church in South Korea has actively engaged in private exchanges and cooperation efforts with North Korea in the past.

It has worked on this through the bishops' National Reconciliation Committee and Caritas International Korea.

"Since 1965, the Korean Catholic Church has been praying for the true peace of the two Koreas and the reconciliation of the nation on June 25 every year," he says.

"Until the day when complete peace is established on the Korean peninsula and divided peoples are united, the Catholic Church of Korea will accompany the journey for reconciliation of the people in unity."

The Declaration presents a turn-around from the situation between the two Koreas last year.

At that time Pyongyang and the President of the United States taunted each other with nuclear threats.

However, in January, the North Korean dictator said he was open to talks.

Within weeks, Korean athletes marched under one flag at the Winter Olympics.

Source

• The Tablet
• Vatican News
• Catholic News Agency
• Image: The Financial Express

He will also actively encourage peace initiatives in the region.

Monsignor Marco Sprizzi has been in charge of the Nunciature in Seoul since the retirement of Apostolic Nuncio Archbishop Osvaldo Padilla last year.

He says Xuereb is "one of the closest allies of Pope Francis and reads the pope's thinking very well."

Xuereb is taking up his diplomatic post amid improving relations between the two Koreas.

The two countries have been technically at war since the 1950-53 Korean War, which ended in an armistice and not a peace treaty.

North Korea and the United States have been trading insults and threatening war for months over the North's nuclear and missile programmes.

After carrying out a number of tests last year, North Korea stopped its testing programme in November.

This has helped improve relations with the South.

Positive developments include the two Koreas marching together under a united flag in the opening ceremony of this year's Winter Olympics in South Korea.

United States President Donald Trump announced last week that he had accepted an invitation to meet with North Korea's supreme leader Kim Jong-un.

The meeting's aim is to negotiate the North's nuclear weapons programme.

Trump will be the first sitting United States president to meet face-to-face with a North Korean leader.

South Korean President Moon Jae-in helped to facilitate the upcoming meeting.

He sent his National Security Advisor Chung Eui-yong to Pyongyang on Monday and then to Washington to convey the North Korean leader's invitation to Trump.

Moon is a practising Catholic who has pledged himself to peaceful dialogue on the Korean peninsula.

Source

• Catholic News Agency
• Vatican News
• Image: Eurasia Review

The two countries are trading insults, with North Korea threatening to send four missiles into the sea off Guam, as a response to President Donald Trump's escalating rhetoric.

"The only way forth is that of dialogue, because the way of conflict is always wrong, says Italian Archbishop Silvano Tomasi.

The current crisis shows how international relations can easily break down when there is a determination "to violate the minimum standard of common sense in dealing with other people," he adds.

"That's why you need to invest time, energy, money, resources in preventing the necessity of arriving at these boiling points of crisis."

U.S. and South Korean Catholic bishops have also called for the U.S. and North Korea to deescalate the current threat of war between them.

Bishop Oscar Cantu, head of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' international justice and peace committee, has written to Secretary Rex Tillerson urging Washington to avoid war and find a dialogue-based solution to the current tensions with Pyongyang.

Cantu says while the threat posed by North Korea should not be "underestimated or ignored," the "high certainty of catastrophic death and destruction from any military action must prompt the United States to work with others in the international community for a diplomatic and political solution based on dialogue."

He also says he and his colleagues support South Korean President Moon Jae-in's proposal to reopen negotiations with North Korea. Catholic bishops in South Korea aslo back this proposal.

Source

• Crux
• The Daily Caller
• Image: Daily Mail

"When it comes to how we should deal with evildoers, the Bible, in the book of Romans[13], is very clear: God has endowed rulers full power to use whatever means necessary — including war — to stop evil," Jeffress says.

"That gives the government … the authority to do whatever, whether it's assassination, capital punishment or evil punishment to quell the actions of evildoers.

"In the case of North Korea, God has given Trump authority to take out Kim Jong-Un.

"I'm heartened to see that our president — contrary to what we've seen with past administrations who have taken, at best, a sheepish stance toward dictators and oppressors — will not tolerate any threat against the American people.

"When President Trump draws a red line, he will not erase it, move it, or back away from it. Thank God for a President who is serious about protecting our country."

Jeffress, who leads a congregation of more than 10,000 people at the First Baptist Dallas, says he decided to make the statement after Trump said if North Korea's nuclear threats to the United States continue, Pyongyang will be "met with fire and fury like the world has never seen".

Jeffress says there is a difference between Christians and the government when he notes many pacifist Christians will cite Romans: 12, specifically: "Do not repay evil for evil,".

That passage is referring to Christians, not to the government, he says.

He further separates Trump as a Christian from Trump the president, saying: "A Christian writer asked me, ‘Don't you want the president to embody the Sermon on the Mount?'".

"I said absolutely not."

Jeffress released his statement on Tuesday evening US time as tensions between the two nuclear powers escalated.

Source

• Religion News Service
• The Washington Post
• Think Progress
• Image: LobeLog