Current:Home > ScamsKim Jong Un and Putin may meet. What do North Korea and Russia need from each other?-LoTradeCoin
Kim Jong Un and Putin may meet. What do North Korea and Russia need from each other?
View Date:2025-01-14 04:13:42
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — North Korean leader Kim Jong Un may travel to Russia for a summit with President Vladimir Putin, a U.S. official said, in a trip that would underscore deepening cooperation as the two isolated leaders are locked in separate confrontations with the U.S.
U.S. officials also said that Russia is seeking to buy ammunition from North Korea to refill reserves drained by its war in Ukraine. In return, experts said, North Korea will likely want food and energy shipments and transfers of sophisticated weapons technologies.
A meeting with Putin would be Kim’s first summit with a foreign leader since North Korea closed its borders in January 2020. They met for the first time i n April 2019, two months after Kim’s high-stakes nuclear diplomacy with then-U.S. President Donald Trump collapsed.
Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu traveled to Pyongyang in July and asked Kim to send more ammunition to Russia, according to U.S. officials. Shoigu said Moscow and Pyongyang were considering holding military exercises for the first time.
It’s unclear how far Kim and Putin’s military cooperation could go, but any sign of warming relations will worry rivals like the U.S. and South Korea. Russia seeks to quash a Ukrainian counteroffensive and prolong the war, while North Korea is extending a record pace of missile tests to protest U.S. moves to reinforce its military alliances with South Korea and Japan.
Here’s a look at what Kim’s possible trip to Russia would mean:
WHAT DOES RUSSIA WANT FROM NORTH KOREA?
Since last year, U.S. officials have suspected that North Korea is providing Russia with artillery shells, rockets and other ammunition, many of which are likely copies of Soviet-era munitions.
“Russia is in urgent need of (war supplies). If not, how could the defense minister of a powerful country at war come to a small country like North Korea?” said Kim Taewoo, former head of Seoul’s Korea Institute for National Unification. He said Shoigu was the first Russian defense minister to visit North Korea since the 1991 disintegration of the Soviet Union.
Buying munitions from North Korea would be a violation of U.N. resolutions, supported by Russia, that ban all arms trade with the isolated country. But now that it faces international sanctions and export controls over its war in Ukraine, Russia has been seeking weapons from other sanctioned countries like North Korea and Iran.
North Korea has vast stores of munitions, but Du Hyeogn Cha, an analyst at Seoul’s Asan Institute for Policy Studies, doubted whether it could swiftly send significant amounts to Russia, because the narrow land link between the countries can handle only a limited amount of rail traffic.
WHAT DOES KIM WANT IN RETURN?
Kim’s priorities would be aid shipments, prestige and military technology, experts said.
“It would be a ‘win-win’ deal for both, as Putin is cornered over his exhausted weapons inventory while Kim faces pressure from the South Korea-U.S.-Japan trilateral cooperation,” said Nam Sung-wook, a former director of the Institute for National Security Strategy, a think tank run by South Korea’s spy agency. “Their needs are matched perfectly now.”
Pandemic-era border closures have left North Korea with severe economic difficulties, and Kim is likely to seek supplies of food and energy to address shortfalls.
Kim will likely also trumpet expanding relations with Moscow as a sign that the country is overcoming its years of isolation. North Korean leaders have long valued face-to-face meetings with world leaders as signs of international importance and for domestic propaganda purposes.
Kim is likely also seeking Russian technology to support his plans to build high-tech weapons systems such as powerful long-range missiles, hypersonic ballistic weapons, nuclear-powered submarines and spy satellites, said Hong Min, an analyst at Seoul’s Korea Institute for National Unification.
It’s unclear whether Russia would be willing to provide North Korea with advanced technologies related to nuclear weapons and ICBMs, Cha said. Russia has always tightly guarded its most important weapons technologies, even from key partners like China, he said.
HOW CLOSE COULD THE TWO COUNTRIES GET?
Shoigu told reporters Monday that Russia and North Korea were pondering the possibility of bilateral military exercise. Earlier, South Korea’s spy agency told lawmakers that Shoigu appeared to have proposed a trilateral training exercise involving China.
Either way, it would be the North’s first joint military drills with a foreign country since the end of the 1950-53 Korean War. The country has avoided training with a foreign military in line with its official “juche,” or “self-reliance,” philosophy.
Kim Taewoo, the former institute director, said expanding South Korea-U.S.-Japan security cooperation could prompt Kim Jong Un to break that taboo and hold drills with Russia and China for the first time.
But Nam, who is now a professor at Korea University, said North Korea won’t likely accept the offer, as it could leave North Korea even more dependent on China and Russia.
Park Won Gon, a professor at Seoul’s Ewha Womans University, said it’s too early to predict what Kim’s diplomacy could yield beyond making a show of defiance toward the United States.
“In any case, North Korea and Russia need to show that they’re working together, that they’re stepping up this cooperation,” Park said. “There clearly are practical areas of cooperation, and also some symbolic aspects they want to show to the United States.”
veryGood! (7)
Related
- Satellite images and documents indicate China working on nuclear propulsion for new aircraft carrier
- Worried About Safety, a Small West Texas Town Challenges Planned Cross-Border Pipeline
- Some state abortion bans stir confusion, and it’s uncertain if lawmakers will clarify them
- If You Don’t Have Time for Holiday Shopping, These Gift Cards Are Great Last-Minute Presents
- Arizona Supreme Court declines emergency request to extend ballot ‘curing’ deadline
- Why Cameron Diaz Says We Should Normalize Separate Bedrooms for Couples
- Body wrapped in tire chains in Kentucky lake identified as man who disappeared in 1999
- The French parliament approves a divisive immigration bill, prompting a heated debate
- Tesla issues 6th Cybertruck recall this year, with over 2,400 vehicles affected
- Christmas cookies, cocktails and the perils of a 'sugar high' — and hangover
Ranking
- Get well, Pop. The Spurs are in great hands until your return
- Some state abortion bans stir confusion, and it’s uncertain if lawmakers will clarify them
- Jeremy Allen White Shares Sizzling Update on The Bear Season 3
- The Emmy Awards: A guide to how to watch, who you’ll see, and why it all has taken so long
- Outgoing North Carolina governor grants 2 pardons, 6 commutations
- Separatist leader in Pakistan appears before cameras and says he has surrendered with 70 followers
- Disney+'s 'Percy Jackson' series is more half baked than half-blood: Review
- A rare and neglected flesh-eating disease finally gets some attention
Recommendation
-
Whoopi Goldberg calling herself 'a working person' garners criticism from 'The View' fans
-
Duane Davis, man charged with Tupac Shakur's killing, requests house arrest, citing health
-
Soccer star Dani Alves’ trial for alleged sexual assault to start in February
-
Three of the biggest porn sites must verify ages to protect kids under Europe’s new digital law
-
Sting Says Sean Diddy Combs Allegations Don't Taint His Song
-
Drilling under Pennsylvania’s ‘Gasland’ town has been banned since 2010. It’s coming back.
-
Horoscopes Today, December 20, 2023
-
What to know about the Colorado Supreme Court's Trump ruling, and what happens next