Seoul, Sep 12: North Korea’s Kim Jong Un rolled into Russia on an armoured train on Tuesday to see President Vladimir Putin, a rare meeting between isolated leaders driven together by their need for support in escalating standoffs with the West.
Kim is expected to seek economic aid and military technology for his impoverished country, and, in an unusual twist, appears to have something Putin desperately needs: munitions for Russia’s gruelling war in Ukraine.
This meeting is a chance for the North Korean leader to get around crippling UN sanctions and years of diplomatic isolation. For Putin, it’s an opportunity to refill ammunition stores that the war has drained.
Any arms deal with North Korea would violate the sanctions, which Russia supported in the past.
North Korea’s official Korean Central News Agency said Kim boarded his personal train bound for Russia on Sunday afternoon, accompanied by members of the ruling party, government and military.
His final destination is uncertain. Many had assumed Kim and Putin would meet in Vladisvostok, a Russian city close to the border where the two leaders had their last meeting in 2019, and which Putin is visiting this week for an economic forum.
But Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov confirmed only that Kim has entered Russia, and state news agency RIA-Novosti later reported his train had headed north after crossing the Razdolnaya River, taking it away from Vladivostok.
The South Korean news agency Yonhap later published a photo that it said showed the train in Ussuriysk, a city about 60 kilometres north of Vladivostok that has a sizeable ethnic Korean population.
Some Russian news media speculate that he is headed for the Vostochny spaceport, which Putin is to visit soon. Putin declined during the forum to say what he intended to do there.
The launching facility is about 900 km northwest of Ussuriysk, but the route there is circuitous and it is unclear how long Kim’s slow-moving train would take to get there.
Peskov said Putin and Kim will meet after the Vladivostok forum, and that the meeting would include a lunch in Kim’s honour. (AP)
