North Korean leader Kim Jong Un met delegates to the ruling party’s youth league congress in Pyongyang, state media ​KCNA said on Sunday, as the government again cast ‌young people as central to both domestic mobilisation and its military role in Russia’s war against Ukraine.

The Eleventh Congress of the Socialist Patriotic Youth League, ​a once-in-five-years political gathering aimed at mobilising citizens aged roughly ​14 to 30, concluded last week with mass rallies, ⁠torchlight parades and a gala in the capital.

Kim on Saturday told ​delegates that youth were the “vanguard” in advancing state goals, calling the ​league a key force for carrying out party decisions.

He urged tighter organisation and ideological discipline and posed for a group photograph with participants, KCNA ​said.

In a letter published on Friday, the ruling Workers’ Party explicitly ​linked youth loyalty to Pyongyang’s involvement in the Ukraine war, telling the congress ‌that ⁠young soldiers sent on overseas operations had “become bombs and flames” in defending the country’s honour.

North Korea sent an estimated 14,000 troops to fight alongside Russian forces in the Kursk region, according to South ​Korean, Ukrainian and ​Western officials, ⁠who say more than 6,000 North Korean soldiers were killed.

Kim last month unveiled a new memorial in Pyongyang ​to honour soldiers killed during those deployments.

The emphasis ​on youth ⁠control comes amid intensified repression of foreign cultural influence, with exposure to South Korean music, films and slang treated as serious political offences, as ⁠Kim ​casts youth policy as a pillar ​of social stability.

He has also increasingly appeared in public with his young daughter, believed to ​be named Ju Ae, at major state events.