Moscow and Pyongyang signed a mutual defense pact last year and North Korea sent thousands of soldiers to help to reconquer the Koursk region, taken by the Ukrainian army during the summer of 2024. North Korea also provides Russia in shells and missiles.
According to KCNA, Kim Jong One told his guest that North Korea was “ready to support and unconditionally encourage all the measures taken by Russian leaders to eliminate the cause of the Ukrainian crisis”.
The North Korean leader also expressed his “firm conviction that the Russian army and the people will win a certain victory by fulfilling the sacred cause of defending the dignity and fundamental interests of the country”.
The two men also discussed “important questions for the faithful implementation of the agreements concluded” during their summit in 2024, when the defense pact had been sealed during a rare visit to North Korea of the Russian President Vladimir Putin.
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Mr. Lavrov said that Mr. Putin hopes “to continue direct contacts” with Kim Jong a “as soon as possible”, according to the Russian state agency TASS.
The Kremlin had been interviewed this week on the possibility of an upcoming visit to the North Korean leader in Russia, but replied that this was not planned for the moment.
The Kim-Lavrov meeting took place in Wonsan, on the east coast of North Korea, where an important tourist complex has just been inaugurated.
“Heroic”
The head of Russian diplomacy also met his North Korean counterpart Choe his Hui, whom he thanked for the “heroic” behavior of the North Koreans deployed alongside the Russian forces against Ukraine, according to Tass.
The two parties “underlined their determination to fight together against the hegemonist aspirations of actors outside the region, which lead to an escalation of tensions in northeast Asia and throughout the Asia-Pacific region”, according to the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Still according to the Russian agency, questioned on the possibility that the North Korean troops were deployed on other parts of the front, Sergei Lavrov replied that it was in Pyongyang to decide.
“We start from the principle that the RPDC itself determines the forms under which we implement our strategic partnership agreement,” he said, using the official acronym of the country, the People’s People’s Republic of Korea.
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His trip to North Korea intervened a month and a half after that of the secretary of the Russian Security Council Sergei Choigou.
Shortly before Mr. Lavrov’s visit, the Russian authorities had announced the launch of a direct flight twice a week between Moscow and Pyongyang.
According to Tass, the Russian diplomacy chief left North Korea on Sunday morning and arrived in China, where he must participate in a ministerial meeting of the Shanghai cooperation organization (OCS).
