The Russian president is expected to sign a number of bilateral documents and discuss sensitive topics with Kim Jong-un
Russian President Vladimir Putin has arrived at Pyongyang International Airport, marking the start of his two-day visit to North Korea, during which he is expected to have a lengthy face-to-face meeting with Kim Jong-un.
The Russian president arrived in the country on Tuesday evening, with most of the talks and events scheduled for the next day. He was greeted at the airport by a delegation of North Korean officials, as well as plaques praising the friendship between the two nations, while the road leading from the airport was lined with Russian flags and portraits of Putin.
The Russian delegation includes numerous top officials, including Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, First Deputy Prime Minister Denis Manturov, Defense Minister Andrey Belousov, Health Minister Mikhail Murashko, and Transport Minister Roman Starovoyt, as well as Roscosmos chief Yuri Borisov, and the head of Russian Railways Oleg Belozyorov.
Putin and Kim are expected to sign a number of bilateral documents, with the Russian leader having earlier authorized the signing of the Comprehensive Strategic Partnership Agreement with North Korea, which outlines “the prospects for further cooperation” between Moscow and Pyongyang.
Putin’s last visit to North Korea was in 2000, when he met with Kim Jong-il, the father of the current leader. Kim traveled to Russia’s Far East last September, with the visit focusing on military and economic cooperation.
In the run-up to his visit, Putin said Russia had consistently supported North Korea in its long “struggle against the treacherous, dangerous and aggressive enemy,” referring to the Western states. The Kremlin has also praised North Korea’s vocal support for Russia in the Ukraine conflict, noting that Pyongyang “understands the true reasons and the essence” of the crisis.
D/C: Putin yet again trying to scare the west .. or?
South Korea’s loudspeaker broadcasts aimed at North Korea include world news and K-pop hits.(Reuters: You Sung-ho, file)
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In short: North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s sister Kim Yo Jong has warned of “new counteraction” against South Korea over loudspeaker broadcasts and the scattering of leaflets.
South Korea resumed the broadcasts directed at North Korea as tensions increased over Pyongyang sending balloons carrying trash over the border.
Pyongyang said the move was in retaliation for anti-North leaflets flown by South Korean activists as part of a propaganda campaign.
The influential sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has warned of a new response against South Korea if the South continues loudspeaker broadcasts and the scattering of leaflets amid simmering tensions.
“If the ROK simultaneously carries out the leaflet scattering and loudspeaker broadcasting provocation over the border, it will undoubtedly witness the new counteraction of the DPRK,” Kim Yo Jong said in a statement late on Sunday carried by state news agency KCNA, using the official names of South and North Korea.
Kim Yo Jong has warned of “new counteraction” after South Korea resumed loudspeaker broadcasts directed at North Korea.(Reuters: Jorge Silva)
“This is a prelude to a very dangerous situation,” said Ms Kim, a vice department director in the ruling Workers’ Party, referring to the South’s loudspeaker broadcasts.
The decision to resume the broadcasts, as a form of psychological warfare, was made after North Korea on Saturday began launching about 330 balloons with trash attached, with about 80 of them dropping over the border, South Korea’s military said.
Pyongyang started sending balloons carrying trash and manure across the border in May. It said the move was in retaliation for anti-North leaflets flown by South Korean activists as part of a propaganda campaign.
North Korea has shown some of the angriest reactions toward the leaflet campaign and the loudspeaker broadcasts, in some cases firing weapons at the balloons and speakers.
South Korea stopped the broadcasts under an agreement signed by the two Korea’s leaders in 2018 but tensions have mounted since then as Pyongyang pushed ahead with weapons development.
South Korea’s broadcasts include world news and information about democratic and capitalist society with a mix of popular K-pop music. The sound is believed to travel more than 20 kilometres into North Korea.
The shift in rhetoric from North Korea’s Kim Jong Un has some experts tabling the possibility that a conflict might be imminent.(AP Photo: KCNA)
Beyond firing artillery rounds into the sea and launching spy satellites, North Korea has been busy removing references and images of reunification with South Korea from its state-run websites, creating alarm among experts.
The moves are the latest concrete evidence that the country’s leader, Kim Jong Un, might be implementing a pledge made in January where he called South Korea a “primary foe” and concluded that reunification was no longer possible.
Pyongyang’s decision to abandon the decades-long goal of reunification — in addition to rekindled relations with Russian President Vladimir Putin — has contributed to escalating tensions on the Korean Peninsula, to a degree that has some experts tabling the possibility that conflict might be imminent.
Here’s a look at what’s led to the current situation, how experts are interpreting the shifts in rhetoric amid the current global context, and whether or not yet another conflict might genuinely be on the brink of breaking out.
What has been going on？
North Korea’s official Korean Central News Agency released photos this week showing field training exercises at an undisclosed location.(AFP: KCNA via KNS)
The initial bombshell came when Mr Kim called for a rewriting of the country’s constitution to eliminate the idea of a peaceful reunification with South Korea — and to cement Seoul as an “invariable principal enemy” — in a speech to the Supreme People’s Assembly earlier this year.
During his speech, Mr Kim blamed South Korea and the United States for raising tensions in the region, citing their expanded joint military exercises, deployments of US strategic military assets, and their trilateral security cooperation with Japan as turning the peninsula into a dangerous war-prone zone.
Following Mr Kim’s speech, the North’s assembly abolished key government agencies that have been instrumental to decades of exchanges with Seoul.
Satellite imagery of Pyongyang showed that a major monument in the capital that symbolised the goal of reconciliation with South Korea was destroyed after the speech.
Satellite imagery revealed that North Korea demolished a major monument in its capital that symbolised the goal of reconciliation with South Korea.(Reuters: Yuri Maltsev)
South Korea’s Yonhap News Agency reported that articles containing unification references have consistently been removed from North Korea’s platforms and messaging: for example, a red-coloured logo of the Korean Peninsula has been removed from the North’s official Foreign Trade site banners.
Mr Kim’s remarks were made amid escalating tensions on the peninsula.
Last month, the North’s state media reported that the Supreme People’s Assembly had voted to scrap all agreements with its neighbour aimed at promoting economic cooperation.
South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol criticised this move to define his country as hostile, saying it showed Pyongyang’s “anti-national and ahistorical” nature.
Seoul has also ramped up joint military exercises with Japan and the US focused on countering the North’s potential use of nuclear weapons, which Mr Kim has portrayed as invasion rehearsals.
What’s the significance and how are experts interpreting it?
Both North and South Korea have ramped up military exercises amid rising tensions. (AP Photo: Ahn Young-joon)
Since the 1950-53 Korean War ended in a stalemate, both Koreas have had policies that treat each other differently than other countries.
That included relying on special agencies and ministries for inter-Korean relations rather than their foreign ministries, and embracing policies for a future peaceful reunification, usually envisioning a single state with two systems.
Colin Alexander, a senior lecturer of political communication at Nottingham Trent University, said scrapping the rhetoric of reunification is a “strategic observation the North has made about politics in the South”.
“South Korea has oscillated between being more inclined towards reunification and [then] moving really far away from it,” he said.
“My interpretation is that North Korea is interpreting this inconsistency with a lot of frustration … and what they realise is [reunification] is so unachievable within the present outlook, that they must move towards a policy which is more realistic.”
Ankit Panda, an expert with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, also recently said that the North has been recalibrating its regional approach since the collapse of the 2019 Hanoi summit.
Vladimir Putin gifted Kim Jong Un a luxury Russian-made limousine — an Aurus — last month.(AP Photo: Sergei Guneyev/File)
“But now, with advanced nuclear and missile capabilities — and the support of Russia and China — Mr Kim feels confident enough to make these changes, which amount to his most consequential proclamations on external affairs since taking power in North Korea,” Mr Panda said.
Russia and North Korea have forged closer ties since Mr Kim and Mr Putin met in September last year and pledged to promote exchanges in all areas as their respective international isolation has deepened over Russia’s war in Ukraine and the North’s ongoing nuclear weapons developments.
As a symbol of their rekindled ties, Mr Putin recently gifted Mr Kim with a Russian-made Aurus luxury limousine — the same type of car Mr Putin is often seen riding around in himself.
Could the situation lead to war?
A photo — released this week — of Kim Jong Un inspecting field training exercises. (Reuters: Korean Central News Agency)
Rising tensions between Pyongyang and Seoul have led many experts to scramble to speculate over the last few months on what sorts of scenarios may lie ahead.
In a report published on the US-based 38 North project, former State Department official Robert Carlin and nuclear scientist Siegfried Hecker said the situation on the peninsula was “more dangerous than it has been at any time since early June 1950”, shortly before the start of the Korean War.
The authors added in no uncertain terms that they believe Mr Kim “has made a strategic decision to go to war” and that “the danger is already far beyond the routine warnings in Washington, Seoul and Tokyo about Pyongyang’s ‘provocations'”.
Hong Min, a senior researcher at the Korea Institute for National Unification in Seoul, added that the policy changes could be perceived as helping North Korea justify using nuclear weapons against the South, as it has increasingly threatened in recent years.
“If they give up on peaceful unification and redefine South Korea as a hostile enemy country with no diplomatic relations, the contradiction of using nuclear weapons against the same people will be eliminated,” Mr Hong said.
But other analysts, as well as officials in Washington and Seoul, say they have spotted no serious signs Pyongyang intends to take imminent military action.
For example, South Korean Defence Minister Shin Won-sik wrote off the claims of increasing risk of war during a recent radio interview as “excessive exaggeration”, adding that such interpretations play into the hands of North Korea’s psychological warfare.
North Korea often displays its missiles in military parades. (AP: Korean Central News Agency)
Dr Alexander added that Mr Kim’s war threats should also be understood in the context of the North’s culture where “national prestige is built around military issues”.
“Because of this propaganda concept North Korean government created domestically, it leads them to having to consistently discuss the military and its readiness [for war].”
But North Korea does not have a “rationale” to actually start a war, Dr Alexander said.
“[Because] if North Korea were to attack the South or anywhere else, there will be significant negative consequences for it.”
RODONG SHINMUNNorth Korean state media published these images of the “underwater nuclear system” when the drones were revealed last April
North Korea says it has carried out a test of its “underwater nuclear weapons system” in response to drills by the US, South Korea and Japan this week.
The test of its supposedly nuclear-armed underwater drones took place off its east coast, state media reported.
The North has claimed tests of its “Haeil-5-23” system before but the weapons have never been independently verified.
South Korea and allies have yet to respond to the latest provocation.
But it comes as the North has ramped up military action in recent weeks, including claiming to have deployed a new solid-fuelled intermediate-range ballistic missile on Sunday.
On Friday, North Korea said it had been provoked by joint drills by Washington, Seoul and Tokyo to carry out a test of its underwater weapons, according to a report by state agency KCNA.
It accused the exercises of “further destabilising the regional situation” and threatening the North’s security.
The US, South Korea and Japan say they have conducted more exercises in the past year as a deterrence response to the increasing frequency of North Korea’s military actions, which include multiple tests of its nuclear ballistic missiles and launches of new weapons. All such actions are in breach of UN sanctions.
But Mr Kim has repeatedly said his regime is building up its military arsenal in preparation for war that could “break out at any time” on the peninsula.
Over the New Year period, he signalled some fundamental policy shifts in his regime’s stance to South Korea.
And earlier this week he declared the former bedrock goal of re-unification with South Korea was over, designating the South as the “principle enemy”.
The rhetoric follows several claimed advances in his country’s military and nuclear capabilities – including in its underwater operations.
Since March 2023, it has also claimed tests of its Haeil system – unmanned, underwater nuclear-armed drones. Haeil means “tsunami” in Korean.
Little is known about these weapons or their claimed performance but North Korean media has described them as being able to sneak into enemy waters and cause large underwater explosions.
Analysts have said that if the weapons function as presented by the North, they would be seen as a less significant weapon than the regime’s nuclear ballistic missiles.
“Considering North Korea’s defence science level and the fact that the weapon is still in a developing stage, it is not yet at a stage to pose a significant threat,” Ahn Chan-il, a defector-turned-researcher at the World Institute for North Korea Studies, told news agency AFP
Late last year Pyongyang also declared it had successfully put a spy satellite in space after earlier failed attempts and has pledged to put three more up this year.
Whether the satellite is actually functioning has yet to be independently verified.
But South Korea said the North had managed to get its satellite up with help from Russia, which in turn reportedly received arms from the North for its war in Ukraine.
Mr Kim had high-profile meetings with Russia’s leader Vladimir Putin and defence minister Sergei Shoigu last year. North Korea’s foreign minister was also in Moscow this week.
D/C: Kim really hates to being ignored. Dangerous!! Trump wined and dined him, now Russia is feeding his ego!!
RODONG SHINMUNNorth Korean state media published these images of the “underwater nuclear system” when the drones were revealed last April
Mark Collins 3Ds Blog 