North Korea’s Kim Jong-un Believed To Be Planning A Trip To Visit Vladimir Putin This Month

IT has been reported that North Korean leader Kim Jong-un is planning to travel to Russia to meet with President Vladimir Putin later this month.

According to The New York Times on Monday, September 4, their sources claimed that the two heads of state will discuss the possibility of North Korea supplying Russia with more weapons and other means, to continue the military operation in Ukraine.

The news outlet said it expected to travel from Pyongyang on an armoured train to meet Putin in the city of Vladivostok, on the Pacific coast of Russia.

His visit is planned as part of the Eastern Economic Forum, which will be held from September 10 to 13, said the news outlet. Their sources also claimed that a visit to Moscow was not ruled out.

Vladimir Putin allegedly hopes to negotiate the supply of artillery shells and anti-tank missiles to Russia according to the publication.

In turn, the North Korean despot hoped to gain access to advanced technologies for satellites and nuclear submarines, while also discussing food supplies for Pyongyang.

A North Korean delegation visited Russia in August

Indirectly confirming the future meeting between the two leaders was the fact that a delegation of about 20 North Korean officials visited Vladivostok at the end of August.

Their entourage apparently included those who oversee the security protocols of senior management. They reportedly travelled by train from Pyongyang to Vladivostok and then flew to Moscow. This ‘test run’ of the potential future route of the DPRK leader took them 10 days to complete.

It is expected that Kim Jong-un will visit the Vostochny Cosmodrome, where Putin met with Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko one year ago.

The White House has not commented yet

Citing intelligence data, White House spokesman John Kirby warned on August 30 that negotiations on military cooperation between Moscow and Pyongyang were in an active phase.

No official comment about Kim Jong-un’s trip to Vladivostok has been made by the White House yet. Adrienne Watson, the US National Security Council spokeswoman previously spoke out about Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu’s recent trip to North Korea.

She said: ‘As we have publicly warned, arms negotiations between Russia and the DPRK are actively moving forward. We have information that Kim Jong-un expects negotiations to continue, possibly including high-level diplomatic engagement’.

Although no peace treaty has ever been officially signed – which technically means that North and South Korea are still at war with one another – Shoigu flew to North Korea in July to take part in celebrations marking the 70th anniversary of the end of the Korean War.

As part of his visit to the DPRK, the Minister of Defence visited an exhibition of weapons and military equipment. He also held negotiations with Kang Sun Nam, his counterpart from the DPRK. They agreed to strengthen Russian-North Korean military ties.

Shoigu’s visit to North Korea was the first visit by the Russian Defence Minister to the country after the collapse of the Soviet Union, as reported by gazeta.ru.

Washington stated last year that Pyongyang was allegedly supplying ammunition to the Russian military. The United States claimed that North Korea had already provided weapons to the Wagner PMC fighters and planned to continue shipping supplies through the Middle East and North Africa.

In response, the North Korean Foreign Ministry called such allegations fabricated and called on the international community to pay attention to the actions of the United States. They claimed that the US was ‘invading Ukraine with various deadly weapons’ and causing destruction.

Russian authorities have repeatedly denied reports of receiving deliveries of North Korean weapons. Last autumn, during a meeting of the UN Security Council, Vasily Nebenzya, Russia’s permanent representative to the UN, called on the US to either provide evidence of such supplies or for Washington to: ‘sign off on the dissemination of inaccurate information’.

The UN later stated that information about possible arms supplies from the DPRK had not been confirmed.