The Putin-Kim Connection: An Unprecedented Shift in North Korean Diplomacy

Uploaded a total of 148 articles starting from the article about the 2019 April bilateral summit

Recently, North Korea, which has been strengthening its relations with Russia, opened a new friendly relations page that collects articles on the North Korea-Russia summit in its state-run media. If you look at the homepage of the North Korean foreign media Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) on the 9th, a Historical Turning Point in North Korea-Russia Friendship Relations page has been created.

This corner contains 148 articles, from the first face-to-face North Korea-Russia summit in April 2019 between Kim Jong Un, General Secretary of the Workers’ Party of Korea, and Vladimir Putin, President of Russia, to the visit of the delegation of educational workers to Russia on the 6th.

Establishing a corner highlighting relations with a specific country is interpreted as unusual because the KCNA is a window for transmitting North Korea’s official position to the outside world.

Some comprehend this as an effort to showcase the friendly relations between the two countries ahead of President Putin’s visit to North Korea.

After the summit last September, North Korean state-run media and the Kremlin confirmed President Putin had accepted Kim’s invitation to visit North Korea.

Also, Aleksandr Matsegora, Russia’s ambassador to North Korea, said in an interview with TASS in February that President Putin is working on a document to be jointly signed with Kim during his visit to North Korea.

Meanwhile, President Putin is expected to hold a summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping during his visit to China in May, his first visit during his fifth term. Given North Korea’s geographical proximity to China, he may also visit North Korea after he visits China. If President Putin’s visit to North Korea is realized, it would be his first visit to North Korea in 24 years since July 2000.