Sir, – Not only does Pyongyang's remake of Napoleon's Arc de Triomphe exceed it in height, as Frank McNally observes (An Irishman's Diary, May 27th), it far exceeds it in conceit.
Built in 1982 to glorify Kim Il-sung, the Supreme Leader of the Democratic People’s Republic of North Korea, on his 70th birthday, it contains 25,500 blocks of white granite, each one representing a day of his life.
After his death, Kim was officially designated “Eternal President of the Republic”.
Even Napoleon didn’t aspire to that. – Yours, etc,
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Dr JOHN DOHERTY,
Vienna.