Washington ( CNN ) -- No veteran should be forgotten , President Barack Obama said Saturday while commemorating the end 60 years ago of the Korean conflict , sometimes described as the `` forgotten war . '' He laid a wreath at the Korean War Veterans Memorial on the National Mall and spoke to veterans and family members with ties to both U.S. and Korean troops , an audience estimated by event organizers to number 5,000 . Active hostilities on the Korean conflict halted six decades ago with the signing of an armistice agreement , leaving the war between the North and South in suspension , and the peninsula divided by a demilitarized zone where tensions remain tense to this day . More than 36,000 U.S. troops died and 103,000 were wounded in the three-year conflict . Fast facts : Korean War . The military says just over 7,900 U.S. troops remain missing , and Obama expressed a commitment to `` give these families a full accounting of their loved ones . '' For example , the family of Sgt . 1st Class William Robinson , who went missing at 26 in 1950 , will bury his remains in Pennsylvania this week , he said . He noted that returning veterans were not welcomed by parades or protests and said these veterans , as do all , `` deserved better . '' Pondering Pyongyang : Beijing 's problem child . `` Here in America , no war should ever be forgotten , and no veteran should ever be overlooked , '' Obama said , pronouncing the war a definitive win . `` Korea was a victory , '' he said , because South Koreans live `` in stark contrast to the repression and poverty of the North . '' North Korea , meanwhile , observed what they called `` Victory Day '' on Saturday in the capital city Pyongyang with a lengthy military parade that was reviewed by leader Kim Jong Un and the Chinese vice president , Li Yuanchao . Cosmetic change , but no real reform , in North Korea . Obama 's remarks come as the U.S. military draws down from over a decade of war in Afghanistan . He said the nation should `` make it our mission to give ( veterans ) the respect and the care and the opportunities that they have earned . '' His wife , first lady Michelle Obama , has led an initiative for veterans and military families called Joining Forces . Talking peace with a backdrop of war . The president was joined by Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel , a Vietnam War veteran who is the first former enlisted soldier to hold that position , as well as representatives from the South Korean government and military and the U.S. government . Hagel said the nearly two dozen nations who aided South Korea `` showed the world that different nations and different peoples and different nations can accomplish many , many good things in the world when we work together . '' Veteran POWs recall misery of North Korean captivity .
The president lays a wreath at the Korean War Veterans Memorial . Family members with ties to both U.S. and Korean troops are on hand . Hide Caption 8 of 55 Photos:Kim Jong Un and North Korea's military Members of a North Korean-made unit march during a mass celebration in Pyongyang for nuclear