Telegram from Pyongyang to Bucharest, TOP SECRET, No.76.064, Regular

On March 13, as you requested, I visited Baek Nam-un, the President of the Supreme People’s Assembly of the DPRK, to whom I handed over the letter of president [of the Romanian Great National Assembly] Stefan Voitec, through which [Voitec] invites Baek Nam-un to visit Romania this year with a Korean parliamentary delegation.

After thanking me for the letter of invitation, the president [Baek Nam-un] said he would be very glad to visit Romania and to this end he would kindly consider the invitation in the light of the current situation in his country and the responsibilities he would assume in the Supreme People’s Assembly this year.

From my conversation with him, I gathered that he had not received such invitations from any other similar bodies in European socialist countries.

Talking in general about the situation in his country, Baek Nam-un said that the Korean government was determined to solve the USS Pueblo case from an activist position, keeping the initiative on its side, without allowing itself to become intimidated by the threats and the pressure exerted by the United States.

Baek Nam-un’s remark that, ‘if the United States dared to attack us, we look forward to it, because this will mark their defeat and their definitive expulsion from our land,’ seemed particularly noteworthy.

All other matters discussed will be included in the minutes of conversation.

Signed: N. Popa