The North Korean leader will make an official visit to Russia “in the coming days”, the Kremlin announced on Monday, while Pyongyang said Kim Jong-Un is expected to meet with Vladimir Putin.
Rumors about Kim Jong-Un’s trip to Russia began circulating a week ago, with Washington suspecting that Moscow, isolated from the West since the attack on Ukraine, is planning to acquire military equipment from its North Korean ally.
If this deal goes through, it would inevitably result in “new sanctions” from the United States, US diplomacy warned again on Monday.
South Korea’s Yonhap news agency reported that Kim Jong-Un’s armored convoy appears to have left for Russia, sharing a short border with North Korea, in the Russian Far East.
This region is not far from Vladivostok, where Putin arrived last Monday to take part in an annual economic forum this Tuesday.
The father and predecessor of the current North Korean number one, Kim Jong Il, had a fear of flying.
His son, who also prefers rail transport for his international travels, does not trust his private jet and is “worried about possible air strikes from Washington,” said Yang Moo-jin, president of the Seoul University of North Korean Studies .
The Kremlin statement simply said the North Korean leader’s trip was “at the invitation of the Russian president,” according to North Korea’s state agency KCNA.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov assured on Monday, before the official announcement of this trip, that no Kim-Putin meeting was planned within the framework of the forum to be held in Vladivostok.
For its part, KCNA states, without further details, that “Respected Comrade Kim Jong-Un will meet and talk with Comrade Putin during his visit.”
According to South Korean television channel YTN, Seoul expects Kim to meet Putin in Russia on Wednesday.
According to the North American newspaper The New York Times, this meeting would take place in Vladivostok, about 700 kilometers from Pyongyang.
The New York Times believes Moscow is seeking artillery shells and anti-tank missiles from Pyongyang, while Kim is seeking advanced technology for satellites and nuclear-powered submarines, as well as food aid.
Kim Jong-Un has not left North Korea since the Covid-19 pandemic began in 2020.
For Andrei Lankov, a North Korea expert at Kookmin University in Seoul, a summit between Putin and Kim is part of Moscow’s “diplomatic blackmail” against Seoul because Russia does not want the South Koreans to supply weapons to Ukraine.
Cheong Seong-chang, a researcher at the Sejong Institute, told France-Presse (AFP) that if North Korea intensifies its military cooperation with Russia, “protracted conflict in Ukraine is more likely.”
Source: DN
