North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has arrived in Russia ahead of an expected meeting with president Vladimir Putin that has sparked Western concerns about a potential arms deal for Moscow’s war in Ukraine.
North Korea’s official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said Mr Kim boarded his personal train on Sunday afternoon, accompanied by unspecified members of the country’s ruling party, government and military.
South Korea’s military assessed the train crossed into Russia sometime early on Tuesday, Jeon Ha Gyu, spokesperson of South Korea’s Defence Ministry, said in a briefing without elaborating on how the military obtained the information.
Mr Kim’s delegation likely includes his foreign minister, Choe Sun Hui, and his top two military officials – Korean People’s Army Marshals Ri Pyong Chol and Pak Jong Chon.
Other officials identified in North Korean state media photos may hint at what Mr Kim might seek from Mr Putin and what he would be willing to give.
The officials include Pak Thae Song, chairman of North Korea’s space science and technology committee, and Navy Admiral Kim Myong Sik, who are linked with North Korean efforts to acquire spy satellites and nuclear-capable ballistic missile submarines.
Experts say North Korea would struggle to acquire such capabilities without external help, although it is not clear if Russia would share such sensitive technologies.
Kim Jong Un is also apparently bringing Jo Chun Ryong, a ruling party official in charge of munitions policies who had accompanied the leader on his recent tours to factories producing artillery shells and missiles, according to South Korea’s Unification Ministry, which analysed the North Korean photos.
North Korea may have tens of millions of artillery shells and rockets based on Soviet designs that could give a huge boost to the Russian army in Ukraine, analysts say.
A possible venue where Mr Kim and Mr Putin could meet is the eastern Russian city of Vladivostok, where Mr Putin arrived on Monday to attend an international forum that runs through Wednesday, according to Russia’s TASS news agency.
Mr Putin’s first meeting with Mr Kim was held in 2019 in the city that is about 425 miles (680 kilometres) north of Pyongyang.
Russian news agencies quoted Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov as saying the two leaders will meet after the Vladivostok forum, but the reports did not specify when or where.
Kim Jong Un is making his first foreign trip since the Covid-19 pandemic during which North Korea tightly enforced border controls for more than three years.
Associated Press journalists near the North Korea-Russia frontier saw a green train with yellow trim similar to one Mr Kim used during previous foreign trips at a station on the North Korean side of a border river on Monday.
US officials released intelligence last week that North Korea and Russia were arranging a meeting between their leaders.
According to US officials, Mr Putin could focus on securing more supplies of North Korean artillery and other ammunition to refill declining reserves as he seeks to defuse a Ukrainian counteroffensive and show that he is capable of grinding out a long war of attrition.
That could potentially put more pressure on the US and its partners to pursue negotiations as concerns over a protracted conflict grow despite their huge shipments of advanced weaponry to Ukraine in the past 17 months.
State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said Washington will monitor the meeting closely, reminding both countries that “any transfer of arms from North Korea to Russia would be a violation of multiple UN Security Council resolutions”, and that the US “will not hesitate to impose new sanctions”.
In exchange, Mr Kim could seek badly needed energy and food aid and advanced weapons technologies, including those related to intercontinental ballistic missiles, nuclear-capable ballistic missile submarines and military reconnaissance satellites, analysts say.
