Xi Jinping to visit North Korea for talks with Kim Jong-un

Xi Jinping is due to visit North Korea on Monday for a two-day trip, with talks expected in Pyongyang with Kim Jong-un. The visit will be Xi's first to North Korea in nearly seven years and comes as Beijing seeks to revive ties with its only formal treaty ally. The trip is taking place against a backdrop of strained relations, including a pandemic-era fall in trade and North Korea's closer alignment with Russia.

Sponsored

The visit is scheduled ahead of the 65th anniversary of the China-North Korea friendship and mutual assistance treaty. That agreement remains China's only defence pact with another country, underlining the formal security dimension of the relationship. China and North Korea fought together against South Korea in the Korean War in the early 1950s, but the current relationship has been shaped by more recent shifts in regional alignments.

North Korea has sent more than 10,000 soldiers to fight for Russia in the Ukraine war, and Moscow and Pyongyang signed a mutual defence pact in 2024. The timing of Xi's trip suggests Beijing wants to prevent its influence in Pyongyang from being overtaken by Moscow's. Analysts have described the China-North Korea relationship as more nostalgic than the rhetoric surrounding North Korea's ties with Russia, which have been reinforced by wartime cooperation.

China also has an interest in maintaining a strategic relationship with North Korea while preserving broader trade ties with the US. That balancing act has become more visible as major powers compete for influence in north-east Asia. The visit also follows a period of high-level diplomatic activity involving China and the US.

Sponsored

Less than one month earlier, Donald Trump visited Beijing for a summit that was presented by China as an effort to stabilise the fraught bilateral relationship. The summit produced few concrete outcomes, although Trump later said he had discussed North Korea with Xi. Against that backdrop, Xi's trip to Pyongyang may be read as part of a wider effort by Beijing to manage regional tensions and reinforce its position in talks over security and trade.

The relationship between Beijing and Pyongyang has long been shaped by security, ideology and geography, but it has also been affected by practical concerns such as border trade and sanctions pressure. The pandemic disrupted that trade sharply, contributing to the recent freeze described by officials and analysts. North Korea's deepening ties with Russia have added a new layer of complexity, especially as Moscow and Pyongyang expand military cooperation.

For China, keeping North Korea close remains important both for regional stability and for limiting the risk of a stronger Russia-North Korea axis. What remains unclear is what concrete outcomes Xi and Kim may announce after the talks. It is not yet known whether the visit will produce new economic, political or security commitments, or whether it will mainly serve as a symbolic reset.

#XiJinping #KimJongun #NorthKorea #China #diplomacy

Sponsored