Kim Jong Un heading to Russia

SEOUL (AP):

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un is heading to Russia for a meeting with President Vladimir Putin that is likely to focus on Russia’s desire to buy ammunition to refill reserves drained by its war in Ukraine.

The meeting will also underscore deepening cooperation as the two isolated leaders are locked in separate confrontations with the US. In return for providing ammunition, North Korea will likely want shipments of food and energy and transfers of sophisticated weapons technologies.

A meeting with Putin would be Kim’s first with a foreign leader since North Korea closed its borders in January 2020. They met for the first time in April 2019, two months after Kim’s high-stakes nuclear diplomacy with then-US President Donald Trump collapsed.

Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu travelled to Pyongyang, North Korea’s capital, in July and asked Kim to send more ammunition to Russia, according to US officials. Shoigu said Moscow and Pyongyang were considering holding military exercises for the first time.

Seoul’s spy agency says Russia has likely proposed North Korea to join three-way drills with China

It’s unclear how far Kim and Putin’s military cooperation could go, but any sign of warming relations will worry rivals like the US 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 US moves to reinforce military alliances with South Korea and Japan.