North Korean leader Kim Jong UNE assured the head of Russian diplomacy Sergei Lavrov his “unconditional” support in the war against Ukraine, considering “certain” Moscow’s victory, Pyongyang’s official media reported on Sunday.
According to the state agency KCNA, Mr. Kim received Mr. Lavrov “in an atmosphere of trust and a warm camaraderie,” when North Korea and Russia press their diplomatic and military ties. The Russian Foreign Ministry has published on Telegram a video of the two men who shake hands and hug.
A mutual defense pact
Moscow and Pyongyang signed a mutual defense pact last year and North Korea sent thousands of soldiers to help reconquer the Koursk region, taken by the Ukrainian army during the summer of 2024. North Korea also provides Russia in shells and missiles.
According to Kcna, Kim Jong One told her guest that North Korea was “ready to support and unconditionally encourage all the measures taken by Russian leaders to eliminate the cause of the Ukrainian crisis.”
The North Korean leader also expressed his “firm conviction that the Russian army and people win a certain victory by fulfilling the sacred cause of defending the dignity and fundamental interests of the country.”
The two men also discussed “important questions for the faithful implementation of the agreements concluded” during their summit in 2024, when the Defense Pact had been sealed during a rare visit to North Korea of the Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Mr. Lavrov said Putin expects “direct contacts” to continue with Kim Jong to “as soon as possible,” according to the Russian state agency Tass. The Kremlin had been interviewed this week about the possibility of an upcoming visit to the North Korean leader in Russia, but replied that this was not planned for the moment.
The Kim-Lavrov meeting took place in Wonsan, on the east coast of North Korea, where an important tourist complex has been inaugurated.
The “heroic” behavior of North Koreans in Ukraine
The head of Russian diplomacy also met his North Koean counterpart his HUI, to whom he thanked the “heroic” behavior of the North Koreans deployed along with the Russian forces against Ukraine, according to Tass.
The two parties “underlined their determination to fight together against the hegemonist aspirations of actors outside the region, which led to an escalation of tensions in the northeast of Asia and throughout the region of Asia and the Pacific,” according to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Russia.
Even so, according to the Russian agency, it was questioned about the possibility that North Korea’s troops were deployed in other parts of the front, Sergei Lavrov replied that he was in Pyongyang decide.
“We begin from the beginning that the RPDC itself determines the forms under which we implement our strategic association agreement,” he said, using the official acronym for the country, the Popular and Democratic Republic of Korea.
His trip to North Korea intervened a month and a half after the Secretary of the Russian Security Council Sergei Choigou. Shortly before the visit of Mr. Lavrov, the Russian authorities had announced the launch of a direct flight twice a week between Moscow and Pyongyang.
According to Tass, the head of Russian diplomacy left North Korea on Sunday morning and arrived in China, where he must participate in a ministerial meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (OCS).
Source: BFM TV
