China’s Xi holds talks with North Korea’s Kim in Beijing

TLE DESK: Chinese President Xi Jinping and Kim Jong
Un met for talks in Beijing on Thursday, state media reported, while the
North Korean leader is in China on a rare foreign visit.

Kim and Russia’s Vladimir Putin flanked Xi at a massive parade of Chinese
military might on Wednesday in Beijing, where underwater drones, massive
missiles and laser weapons were showcased to the foreign leaders, reports AFP.

China is North Korea’s most important ally, their relationship forged in the
bloodshed of the Korean War in the 1950s.

Chinese state media said Kim and Xi met for talks in Beijing’s Great Hall of
the People.

China’s foreign ministry said earlier the talks would be “an in-depth
exchange of views on China-DPRK relations and issues of common concern”,
using the acronym for North Korea.

“China is willing to work with the DPRK to strengthen strategic
communication… (and) deepen the exchange of experience in governance,”
spokesman Guo Jiakun said.

Kim arrived in Beijing on Tuesday accompanied by his daughter Kim Ju Ae, his
second reported trip abroad in six years and his first to China since 2019.

His attendance at the parade was the first time he was seen with Xi and Putin
at the same event.

Kim enjoyed a brief bout of high-profile international diplomacy from around
2018, meeting US President Donald Trump and then South Korean president Moon
Jae-in several times.

However, he withdrew from the global scene after the collapse of a summit
with Trump in Hanoi in 2019.Beijing has historically provided diplomatic, economic and political support
to the secretive North, which remains under crippling international
sanctions.