Top DPRK leader holds meeting to discuss Party Congress preparations

PYONGYANG - The Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK)'s top leader Kim Jong-un presided over a Politburo meeting on Sunday to discuss plans and preparations for the upcoming eighth Party Congress slated for January next year, the Korean Central News Agency reported on Monday.

The enlarged meeting of the 21st Political Bureau of the seventh Central Committee of the Workers' Party of Korea (WPK) also "examined relevant issues for improving and strengthening the Party ideological work as required by the developing revolution, and approved the organization mechanism issue."

The DPRK's eighth Party Congress will be held in January, in which a new five-year economic development plan will be discussed and endorsed after the current five-year plan is completed this year.

At the meeting, the country's economic institutions were "harshly criticized" for "not guiding their sectors scientifically ... and for failing to overcome subjectivism and formalism in their work," the report said.