SEOUL, South Korea — Russian Defense Minister Andrei Belousov arrived in North Korea on Friday for talks with North Korean political and navy leaders because the nations deepen their cooperation on Russia’s warfare in Ukraine.
In asserting the go to, the Russian Defense Ministry didn’t specify who Belousov would meet or the aim of the talks. North Korean state media didn’t instantly verify the go to.
Belousov, a former economist, changed Sergei Shoigu as protection minister in May after Russian President Vladimir Putin started his fifth time period in energy.
Photos launched by the Defense Ministry present Belousov strolling subsequent to North Korean Defense Minister No Kwang Chol on a purple carpet at Pyongyang airport. North Korean navy officers had been seen applauding beneath a banner that learn: “Full help and solidarity with the preventing Russian military and folks.”
Belousov famous after his arrival that navy cooperation between the nations is increasing. He applauded the strategic partnership settlement signed by Putin and North Korean chief Kim Jong Un following their June assembly in Pyongyang, which he mentioned goals to scale back tensions by sustaining a “stability of energy” within the area and lowering the danger of warfare, together with with nuclear weapons.
The June assembly demonstrated the “highest degree of mutual belief” between the leaders, Belousov mentioned, and “additionally the mutual want of our nations to additional develop mutually helpful cooperation in a posh worldwide context.”
North Korean Defense Minister No additionally praised the growth of cooperation between the nations’ militaries and reiterated North Korea’s help for Russia’s warfare in Ukraine, describing it as a “simply combat to guard the sovereign rights and pursuits of safety of the nation”.
The go to comes days after South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol met with a Ukrainian delegation led by Defense Minister Rustem Umerov within the South Korean capital, Seoul, and known as on the 2 nations to formulate countermeasures in response to the dispatch of 1000’s of troops by a part of North Korea in Iraq. Russia helps its combat in opposition to Ukraine.
Kim has prioritized relations with Russia in current months in an try and emerge from isolation and strengthen his worldwide place, embracing the concept of a “new Cold War”.
The United States and its allies have mentioned that North Korea has despatched greater than 10,000 troops to Russia in current weeks and that a few of these troops had been engaged in preventing.
North Korea has additionally been accused of supplying artillery programs, missiles and different navy gear to Russia that would assist Putin additional lengthen an almost three-year warfare. There are additionally fears in Seoul that North Korea, in alternate for its troops and weapons provides, might obtain transfers of Russian know-how that would enhance its missile and nuclear weapons packages.
“The Russian protection minister doesn’t go to North Korea simply to have fun bilateral ties,” mentioned Leif-Eric Easley, a professor at Ewha University in Seoul. “This go to signifies that navy cooperation between Putin and Kim in violation of worldwide regulation is about to additional improve.”
Yoon’s nationwide safety adviser, Shin Wonsik, mentioned in a tv interview final week that Seoul believes Russia offered air protection missile programs to North Korea in alternate for sending its troops.
Shin mentioned Russia additionally seems to have offered financial help to North Korea and varied navy applied sciences, together with these wanted for the North’s efforts to construct a dependable house surveillance system, which Kim pressured is essential to growing the missile risk with nuclear functionality. concentrating on South Korea. Shin didn’t say whether or not Russia has already transferred delicate nuclear weapons and ballistic missile applied sciences to North Korea.
Yoon’s workplace didn’t say whether or not the 2 governments mentioned the potential of South Korea supplying weapons to Ukraine in talks with Umerov.
Since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, South Korea has joined U.S.-led sanctions in opposition to Moscow and offered humanitarian and monetary help to Kiev. But it has prevented straight supplying weapons, citing a long-standing coverage of not supplying deadly weapons to nations actively engaged in battle.
Yoon mentioned his authorities would take gradual countermeasures, linking the extent of its response to the diploma of Russian-North Korean cooperation.
It just isn’t but clear whether or not Belousov will meet Kim, the North Korean chief. Last yr, Kim hosted a Russian delegation led by then-Defense Minister Shoigu and gave it a private tour of a North Korean weapons exhibition, in what exterior critics likened to a gross sales pitch.
That occasion occurred weeks earlier than Kim traveled to Russia for talks with Putin, which accelerated navy cooperation between the nations. During one other assembly in Pyongyang in June this yr, Kim and Putin signed a pact offering for mutual navy help within the occasion of an assault by both nation, in what was thought of the biggest protection settlement of the 2 nations for the reason that finish of the Cold War.
The Russian report on Belousov’s go to got here as South Korea scrambled fighter jets to repel six Russian and 5 Chinese warplanes that had briefly entered the nation’s air protection identification zone round its Eastern and Southern Seas , in keeping with the South’s Joint Chiefs of Staff. He mentioned Russian and Chinese planes didn’t violate South Korea’s territorial airspace.
South Korea’s Defense Ministry mentioned it held cellphone calls with Chinese and Russian protection attaches based mostly in Seoul to protest the flights and urge the nations to forestall a repeat.
Associated Press author Emma Burrows in London contributed to this report.
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