Putin’s best friend routine with Kim Jong-un is a clear and present danger to the West

Kim Jong-un is not new to striking up sudden friendships with the world’s powerful leaders. There were the memorable times with Donald Trump after the exchange of letters described as “beautiful” by the US president, followed by tender moments in meetings which were supposed to reshape geopolitics.

Nothing much came from the sessions of mutual admiration, apart from a temporary suspension by North Korea of ballistic missile building and deep apprehension from America’s allies in the region that Trump may do a deal with Kim jeopardising their security. That did not materialise in the end, to much relief.

Now Kim has a new bestie, Vladimir Putin, and this presents a clear and present danger to the West and its allies. North Korea is already stepping in to replenish Russia’s exhausted ammunition and missile stock for the Ukraine war. Moscow has been accused of circumventing international sanctions to help Kim develop his military arsenal as well as planning to help his nuclear programme.

Putin and Kim are due to sign a “comprehensive strategic partnership treaty” which, the Russian president said “will build an architecture of equal and indivisible security in Eurasia” and “develop alternative mechanisms of trade and mutual settlements that are not controlled by the West, and jointly resist illegitimate unilateral restrictions”. The North Korean leader has pledged to build “meaningful ties and close comradeship and full solidarity with the Russian army and its people, an unbreakable partnership in all possible areas”.

The meeting this week is the first time that Kim has hosted a foreign leader since the Covid-19 pandemic. Putin’s visit, his first to the country for 24 years, is one of the rare occasions he has ventured outside Russia since the invasion of Ukraine two years ago.

open image in gallery

The Russian president will be accompanied by foreign minister Sergei Lavrov and new defence minister Andrei Belousov. They will be staying at the Kumsusan guesthouse, where Chinese leader Xi Jinping was hosted during a 2019 state visit. The road from Sunan International Airport to the city centre has been lined with Russian flags, portraits of Putin and banners proclaiming Kim’s achievements. State TV is broadcasting concerts of Russian military music and North Korean war songs.

The trip comes just a few days after the G7 summit in Italy attended by Volodymyr Zelensky in which the US and the European Union agreed to provide Ukraine with a soft loan of $50bn (£39bn) accrued from frozen Russian assets. This was followed by a Kyiv-orchestrated “peace summit” in Switzerland in which more than 80 countries and organisations agreed to ceasefire communique.

Kim travelled in his armoured train to Russia’s far-east region last September to visit factories producing rocket launching facilities and fighter jets as well as meet the Kremlin leadership. At one point he and Putin toasted each other to mark their “sacred struggle” against the “band of evil” in the West.

There has been a marked increase in trade between the two countries. Britain’s Defence Intelligence agency, monitoring shipping, helped discover that Moscow has sent 30 Orlov Trotter horses to North Korea: Kim likes being photographed on white mounts. He and his daughter were seen being driven around in a Russian Auris limousine, sent by the Kremlin despite there being an international ban on exporting luxury goods to Pyongyang.

open image in gallery

North Korea has sent a significant amount of artillery rounds and missiles to Russia. Pyongyang has denied this, but there is evidence to the contrary. For instance, a message from a Russian paratrooper officer, intercepted by Western agencies, read “the grads [missiles] have arrived at the northern front from our North Korean comrades”.

The Russians have not just been sending fancy horses and cars. Washington claims that refined petroleum was being shipped to North Korea in volumes exceeding Security Council limits. Moscow has offered help in launching satellites, which can improve the monitoring of military targets. Pyongyang-sponsored hackers have been using Russian cryptocurrency exchanges to launder funds looted in cyberattacks. North Korea, it is claimed, is seeking Russian help in upgrading its nuclear programme.

Putin has a lot to thank North Korea for in the Ukraine conflict. As Lloyd Austin, the US defence secretary stressed last month, North Korean munition and missiles (along with Iranian drones) have enabled Russian forces “to get back on their feet”. South Korean authorities have charted the sending of more than three million rounds of 152mm artillery shells and more than 500,000 rounds of 122mm multiple rocket launchers in six months.

Russia has secured a military ally and a source of weapons supply at a time when relations with the West have plummeted to the coldest point since the Cold War itself. North Korea is taking a big step in aligning itself so closely with Putin. Donald Trump, whose own attempted rapprochement with Kim Jong-un failed, will find a new reality in east Asia and beyond, if and when he gets back to the White House.