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Korean Central Television, a North Korean state-run operation, reported on March 16, 2024, that leader Kim Jong-un had attended the ceremony marking the completion of a greenhouse farm complex with his daughter Ju-ae on March 15. The Aurus Senate limousine gifted to Kim by Russian President Vladimir Putin made an appearance on the report. (KCTV/Yonhap)

Once Russian President Vladimir Putin’s election to his fifth term as president was confirmed, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un hastened to send a congratulatory cable on Monday.

“I will firmly join hands with you and bring about a new era of the [North Korea]-Russia friendship with long historical roots and traditions in conformity with the requirements of the times,” Kim wrote in the cable, which was published by the state-run Korean Central News Agency.

In the cable, Kim also promised to “push forward with the accomplishment of the cause of building a powerful country, the aspiration and desire of the peoples of the two countries.”

“I am firmly convinced that, under your energetic and correct guidance, the Russian people will surely win victory in the cause of [. . .] realizing international peace and justice and building an independent multipolar world.”

When voting began in Russia’s presidential election on Friday, Kim drove in his Aurus luxury limousine, a gift from Putin, to attend the ribbon-cutting ceremony at the Kangdong General Greenhouse Farm, on the outskirts of Pyongyang, in a flourish that highlighted Pyongyang and Moscow’s chummy ties to the wide world.

The tighter bond between North Korea and Russia is expected to have major ramifications for Northeast Asian affairs going forward.

Putin is likely to visit North Korea before the end of the year. Putin has indicated he will accept an invitation that Kim extended in a banquet held after the two leaders’ summit at the Vostochny Cosmodrome in the Russian Far East last September.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov confirmed Putin’s intention to visit North Korea in January, remarking that the visit would take place in the near future.

Putin is the only Russian leader to have ever visited North Korea. That visit took place in July 2000, four months after Putin was first elected Russian president in March 2000.

At the time, Putin was focused on restoring relations between the two countries, which underwent a chill after the fall of the Soviet Union. Those efforts led to Pyongyang-Moscow relations being redefined as a partnership for economic cooperation, rather than the military alliance of the Soviet era.

But more recently, North Korea and Russia have been moving toward strengthening military cooperation once more.

Russia has been importing North Korean missiles and artillery shells amid its prolonged war against Ukraine, which began when Russia invaded in February 2022. There are ongoing allegations that North Korea is receiving technological assistance from Russia in connection with its intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) program.

In a report released last month, the US-based Center for Strategic and International Studies said that North Korea had sent at least 25 shipments of artillery shells and other weaponry to Russia since August 2023 which were estimated to contain at least 2.5 million shells and rounds of ammunition.

Putin recently made remarks that could be interpreted as the first step toward officially recognizing North Korea as a nuclear weapon state in defiance of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons. He said in an interview with Rossiya-1 state television on March 13 that North Korea “has its own nuclear umbrella.”

Russia’s attempts to bolster ties with North Korea appear aimed at increasing its influence in Northeast Asia as South Korea, the US and Japan boost trilateral security cooperation in the region.

“Russia argues that the current situation — in which South Korea, the US and Japan are rapidly strengthening their ties and South Korea and Japan are becoming cooperative partners with NATO — constitutes a threat with no corollary in the past. [Under these circumstances,] more and more Russians believe they have no choice but to strengthen relations with North Korea,” said Lee Tae-rim, a professor at the Korea National Diplomatic Academy.

While South Korea faces a major challenge in its relations with Russia, experts say that such a time is exactly when Seoul needs to keep working to create room for diplomacy.

“Russia believes that the US is building a new military bloc in the Asia-Pacific region, and South Korea has already basically become a part of the Western [grouping]. As long as there’s no way for Russia to improve its relations with the US, there’s little chance of Seoul-Moscow relations being restored to the way they were before the war in Ukraine,” observed Lee Sok-bae, a former South Korean ambassador to Russia.

“That’s all the more reason for South Korea to keep open channels for high-level dialogue with Russia and to make an effort to build spaces for diplomacy [with Russia],” Lee said.

Russia is also likely to continue cooperating with China, which currently has poor relations with the US. Russia and China kicked off five days of joint military exercises with Iran in the Gulf of Oman, in the Arabian Sea, on March 11.

By Jang Ye-ji, staff reporter

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