North Korean leader Kim Jong-un paid tribute at the Geumsusan Palace of the Sun mausoleum on Thursday to mark his late father's 75th birthday.
 
The North’s official Korean Central News Agency(KCNA) said the young leader visited the Geumsusan Palace, where the bodies of former North Korean leaders Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong-il are enshrined, at midnight on Thursday and expressed respects for his father and predecessor Kim Jong-il.
 
High-level government and military officials accompanied Kim during the visit, including Hwang Pyong-so, chief of the general political bureau of the Korean People's Army, and the ruling Workers' Party secretaries Kim Ki-nam and Choe Tae-bok.  
 
Kim Won-hong, who is known to have been recently sacked from his post as Minister of State Security, and Choe Ryong-hae, vice chairman of the Central Committee of the Workers' Party, were not present at the event, following their absence in a national Workers’ Party meeting in Pyongyang on Wednesday.
 
Since 1995, the year after the death of North Korean founder Kim Il-sung, the North has celebrated Kim Jong-il’s birthday, February 16th, as the country’s biggest holidays along with Kim Il-sung’s birthday, April 15th. 
 
The North has called Kim Jong-il’s birthday Kwangmyongsong Day, or Day of the Shining Star, since 2012. 

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