Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Andrei Rudenko said Moscow would pass on details of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un's visit to Russia to Seoul if South Korea requested such information.
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| North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and President Putin meet in Vladivostok, 2019. (Source: AP) |
Interfax news agency on September 12 quoted Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Andrei Rudenko as saying that Moscow will pass on to Seoul details of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un's planned visit to Russia if South Korea requests such information.
“We have the South Korean embassy in Moscow, if they want, we can provide the available information,” Mr. Rudenko said. He also stressed that Russia will continue to communicate with South Korea because Seoul is Moscow’s trade partner and both have “common interests in stabilizing the situation in Northeast Asia and the Korean Peninsula.”
Earlier, the South Korean military announced that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un "apparently" arrived in Russia on a private train in the early morning of September 12 and is expected to hold a rare meeting with President Vladimir Putin on the same day.
Russia has not confirmed any details of the trip, but the Kremlin issued a statement on Monday confirming that Mr Kim would make an “official visit to the Russian Federation in the coming days” at Putin’s invitation.
Earlier, the Korean Central News Agency said Mr Kim left North Korea by train on Sunday and was "accompanied by top officials of the Party, government and armed forces organs".
North Korean state media showed photos of Mr. Kim walking past an honor guard and a crowd of civilians holding national flags and flowers, as well as him waving from a green and yellow armored train before leaving the station. Mr. Kim’s delegation may include Foreign Minister Choe Sun Hui and his top military officials, including Marshals of the Korean People’s Army Ri Pyong Chol and Pak Jong Chon.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov added that the talks between the two sides will focus on bilateral relations, “Like any neighboring country, we feel obliged to develop good, mutually beneficial relations.”
According to Russia's TASS news agency, the location of the two leaders' meeting could be the eastern Russian city of Vladivostok, where the Eastern Economic Forum is taking place. Vladivostok, about 500 km north of Pyongyang, was also the location of Mr Putin's first meeting with Mr Kim in 2019.
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