Call between the two leaders comes days ahead of US President Donald Trump’s summit with Putin in Alaska.
Russian President Vladimir Putin lauded the “bravery” and “heroism” of North Korean soldiers in retaking Russia’s Kursk region from Ukrainian forces during a call with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, North Korean state media has reported.
Putin told Kim that he “highly appreciated” North Korea’s support and the “self-sacrificing spirit” displayed by its troops during the liberation of the western region, the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported on Wednesday.
Kim expressed his “heartfelt thanks” to Putin and said Pyongyang would “always remain faithful” to the spirit of the mutual defence treaty signed by the sides last year, as well as “fully support all measures to be taken by the Russian leadership in the future”, the KCNA said.
“The heads of states of the two countries exchanged views on the issues of mutual concern,” the KCNA said.
“Kim Jong Un and Putin agreed to make closer contact in the future.”
The call, days before Putin is set to meet United States President Donald Trump in Alaska to discuss efforts to end the war in Ukraine, is the latest sign of strengthening ties between North Korea and Russia amid Moscow’s ostracisation on the world stage.
“There are a lot of ifs still in the air, but the call suggests there’s a role for Russia, similar to the role South Korea played in 2018, in helping create an opening for US-DPRK relations,” Jenny Town, the director of the Korea programme at the Stimson Center in Washington, DC, told Al Jazeera.
“It might not be a focal point of the upcoming meeting but it is likely to be part of the conversation.”
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Last month, Kim told Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs Sergey Lavrov that Pyongyang would “unconditionally support” all actions taken by Moscow in Ukraine, according to North Korean state media reports.
North Korea has deployed more than 10,000 troops to support Russia’s war and has drawn up plans to dispatch thousands more, according to assessments by South Korea’s National Intelligence Service.
In April, Putin announced that Moscow had fully recaptured Kursk, though Ukrainian officials disputed his claim that the entire region had been brought under Russian control.
At his scheduled summit with Putin on Friday, Trump is expected to press the Russian leader to agree to a peace deal.
On Monday, he told reporters that he will probably know within the “first two minutes” of meeting Putin whether they can reach a deal and that any agreement would involve “some swapping, changes in land” between Moscow and Kyiv.