SEOUL: Hundreds of North Koreans have been honoured ahead of this week's anniversary marking 100 years since the birth of founder Kim Il-Sung, as new leader Kim Jong-Un seeks to consolidate his grip on power.
Pyongyang's official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said a total of 119 soldiers and workers as well as an orchestra, a garment factory and a cigarette producer received the highest Order of Kim Il-Sung.
They were praised for their revolutionary feats and contributions to the construction of a "powerful and prosperous socialists state", KCNA said.
Separately, a total of 298 officials and members of the Socialist Youth League and 211 children received the Kim Il-Sung Youth Honour Prize and the Kim Il-sung Children Honour Prize, respectively.
The North has also conferred the Kim Il-Sung Prize on 18 people for their cultural feats in glorifying the achievements of late leader Kim Jong-Il, who died of heart attack in December last year.
State awards, gifts and special rations are used by the North to elicit loyalty to its communist dynasty.
North Korea is to mark the centenary, which falls on April 15, with a controversial launch of a rocket in defiance of international condemnation.
While Pyongyang has said the launch is to put a satellite in space, Western countries see it as a thinly-disguised test for a long-range missile.
Kim Jong-Il's third son Kim Jong-Un became supreme commander of the highly militarised country following his father's death.
He is widely expected to pick up the deceased leader's two other titles party secretary general and chairman of the powerful National Defence Commission -- on the occasion of the centenary.
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