Xi Jinping set to meet Kim Jong-un in North Korea, as China seeks to revitalize ties | North Korea

Xi Jinping heads to North Korea on Monday for a two-day trip, his first in nearly seven years, as the Chinese president seeks to revitalize ties with his smaller ally.

Xi is expected to meet North Korean leader Kim Jong-un in Pyongyang. North Korea is China’s only official ally, but in recent years their relations have been strained by a near freeze in trade during the Covid-19 pandemic and Pyongyang’s increasingly close relationship with Russia.

Xi’s trip comes as the 65th anniversary of the signing of the Treaty of Amity and Mutual Assistance between China and North Korea approaches, a pact that remains the only defense agreement between China and another country.

Chinese and North Korean troops fought side by side against South Korea in the Korean War in the early 1950s. But North Korea and Russia have a much more recent history of military cooperation. North Korea has sent more than 10,000 troops to fight alongside Russia in the war in Ukraine, and in 2024 Moscow and Pyongyang signed a mutual defense pact.

“In North Korean propaganda, there are some really exaggerated paeans to the closeness woven with Russia in a common war. Whereas with China, it’s a bit nostalgic,” said John Delury, a senior fellow at the Asia Society.

“They don’t want to let North Korea’s proximity to Russia take too much precedence over ties with China.”

Xi, Kim and Russian President Vladimir Putin stood side by side during a major military parade in Beijing in September last year. This event projected a show of force by the future leaders of a new world order led by autocrats. But behind the scenes, men must strike a delicate balance to preserve their personal interests. More than Russia and North Korea, China also wishes to maintain a strategic relationship, at least in commercial matters, with the United States.

Xi’s visit to Pyongyang comes less than a month after U.S. President Donald Trump visited Beijing for a highly anticipated summit that was billed by China as a stabilization of strained U.S.-China relations. Although the Trump-Xi summit did not bring tangible results, the US president later said he had discussed North Korea with Xi.

There has been speculation that Trump may have asked Xi to deliver a message to Kim. Trump has repeatedly said he would like to meet the North Korean leader again.

In recent years, Beijing and Washington have moved away from their previously united front opposing North Korea’s nuclear development. When Xi and Kim met in Beijing last year, their official reports for the first time omitted any mention of denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, and although the White House said that Trump and Xi “confirmed their shared goal of denuclearizing North Korea” after their meeting in May, Beijing has not confirmed that statement.

On Sunday, Kim Yo-jong, Kim’s sister who wields considerable power within the regime, called claims that Xi and Trump discussed denuclearization “false.”

Last week, North Korea unveiled a new nuclear material production facility and Kim called for an “exponential” expansion of the country’s atomic arsenal.

A bigger priority for Xi than nuclear negotiations will be defending China’s own security interests in Northeast Asia, most likely the threat he sees from Japan.

Xi reportedly became unusually animated when discussing the issue of what China sees as Japan’s growing militarism with Trump and with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, who visited Beijing in January. Japan rejects the assertion that a more proactive defense policy would amount to the “new militarism” described by China.

Delury said any cooperation between Beijing and Pyongyang on Japan would likely be rhetorical rather than practical.

This visit is also notable because it is an overseas trip for Xi. In recent months, he has hosted many world leaders and now travels abroad less frequently than before the pandemic. That he is willing to travel to North Korea reflects both the proximity of ally China — just minutes by plane or even train from Beijing — and the importance of the bilateral relationship.

William Yang, senior analyst at Crisis Group, said: “In light of North Korea’s recent waves of missile tests, including the announcement of successful tests of AI-guided missiles, Xi likely sees the need to appear in person in Pyongyang to prevent an escalation of tensions on the Korean Peninsula. »

Xi’s goal is “not to let North Korea stray too far from China’s orbit, which always worries Beijing,” Delury said.