The Liberation Monument in Pyongyang, North Korea, was built in 1947 to honor Red Army soldiers who helped free Korea from Imperial Japan in the last stage of World War II. Soviet paratroopers took control of Pyongyang on August 24, 1945.
The whole structure is 98 feet (30 meters) high. It is a stele topped with a five-pointed red star, on a square base. Each side of the base has an inscription in Russian and Korean. The front says the Soviet people defeated Japanese imperialists and liberated the Korean people. The back is dated August 15, 1945, like the front.
The 1947 design included the Taegukgi, a Korean woman waving it over Heavenly Lake, and an image of Joseph Stalin. The monument survived the Korean War. In 1959 it was redesigned before a planned visit by Nikita Khrushchev that was canceled, and the Stalin image and the Taegukgi were removed.
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