North Korea to convene rubber-stamp parliament in mid-January

The North Korean Supreme People’s Assembly (SPA), the isolated country’s rubber-stamp parliament, will convene on Jan. 17 to discuss government budget
and other issues, state media said on Wednesday, amid mounting economic challenges.
The North’s parliament rarely meets and usually serves to approve decisions on issues such as governing structures and budgets that have been created by the state’s ruling Workers’ Party, members of which form the vast majority of the assembly.
The January session will follow a plenary meeting of the ruling party’s central committee in late December where Pyongyang is expected to set major policy directions for the new year after an unprecedented number of missile tests this year.