News
A local school in the Russian Far Eastern city of Khabarovsk, located 19 miles from the border with China, has established a youth club dedicated to the study of Juche, the political ideology of North Korea.
According to an Oct. 29 report from Russian state-owned news agency TASS, Khabarovsk School No. 80 launched the Juche Studies group with the support of North Korean Consul Lee Sang Il. The initiative was led by history teacher and deputy principal for educational activities, Vladislav Kushnirenko.
Kushnirenko noted that the school’s students have already participated in three events, including a discussion of the first volume of Kim Il Sung’s memoirs, With the Century. The students are now working on research projects covering topics such as “Juche Ideology,” “North Korean Economic Development under Marshal Kim Jong Un,” “The Korean People’s Army Air Force: Past, Present, and Future,” “The Resurgence of Japanese Militarism as a Threat to Russia and North Korea,” and “The Defeat of American Aggressors in the Battle of Taejon.”
In an interview with the Moscow-based broadcaster RTVI, Kushnirenko said the school administration supported the society’s creation. The Juche Youth Society’s meetings will be held outside regular class hours, but content on the Korean War and the ongoing war in Ukraine will be integrated into 11th-grade history lessons.
Kushnirenko also discussed plans to arrange trips to North Korea for the society’s members:
“Every year, we’ll organize trips for Society members to Pyongyang and the 'Songdowon' [International Children's] Camp, as we did in 2024. If teachers from other schools are interested in joining the Society’s activities, I’ll actively collaborate with them.”
Kushnirenko expressed hope that the society would grow into “a large organization attracting students interested in North Korea from across Khabarovsk.”
Juche, typically translated as “self-reliance,” is the state ideology of North Korea, allegedly conceptualized by the country’s founder and first leader, Kim Il Sung. At its core, Juche asserts that North Korea must remain separate and distinct from the rest of the world, relying solely on its own resources and the near-divine guidance of its leader.
The news comes amid reports of North Korea’s potential involvement in Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. An Oct. 29 Pentagon report said that close to 10,000 North Korean troops have been dispatched to Russia for training. “Initial indications are that these troops will be employed in some type of infantry role,” said Pentagon press secretary Air Force Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder. “We remain concerned that Russia intends to use these soldiers in combat or to support combat operations against Ukrainian forces in Kursk.” South Korea's presidential office confirmed Wednesday that over 3,000 North Korean soldiers have already been positioned near frontlines in western Russia.
Independent Russian investigative outlet Agentstvo (lit. “The Agency”) noted that in December 2022, Kushnirenko and activists from the regional “Council of Fathers,” of which he is a member, staged a public destruction of books. The targeted works, by Elena Prokasheva (Elena Malisova) and Ekaterina Dudko (Katya Selvanova), were “A Summer in the Red Scarf” and “Silence of the Swallow” — a coming-of-age fiction series exploring LGBTQ+ themes within the context of the Soviet Union.
The activists bought out the books' entire stock from a local store for the event. Kushnirenko then commented that he was “glad to contribute to saving our youth, our civilization…from false Western values.” In a video, he tears apart a book, saying, “I’m happy to do this. It’s all disgusting, pathetic, and has no place in Russia.”
As of at least 2018, Kushnirenko held the position of deputy head of the Khabarovsk branch of the historical society Double-Headed Eagle. The society’s leader is Konstantin Malofeev, often referred to as an “Orthodox oligarch.” Members of the group are trained in drone operation and also make camouflage nets and trench candles for use by Russian soldiers in Ukraine. Kushnirenko has invited veterans of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine to the school to discuss topics including the origins of the war and the conflict’s purported similarity to World War II, according to Agentstvo’s report.
In May, Kushnirenko and other pro-government activists staged a protest outside the Japanese consulate in Khabarovsk, holding a banner that read, “His wife’s a pedophile, the Prime Minister’s gay. And Macron will teach us how to live?”
The protest was organized to coincide with a meeting between diplomats from Germany, Switzerland, and France with the Japanese Consul General in Khabarovsk.