Chinese leader Xi Jinping is travelling to North Korea next week, the two countries announced on Friday, in what will be his first visit in nearly seven years.
His trip is the latest in a series of steps by China to reinforce its close ties with the nuclear-armed neighbour, whose leader Kim Jong Un has reached out to Russia in recent years, notably by sending troops and conventional weapons to support its war against Ukraine.
Mr Kim has likewise been cozying up again to China, the North’s biggest trade partner and aid provider, in the past year.
“As North Korea builds closer ties with Russia, China seeks to use Xi’s trip to reassert its influence over Pyongyang and safeguard its strategic interests in northeast Asia,” said William Yang, an analyst for the International Crisis Group.
Mr Xi will make a state visit from Monday to Tuesday, state media from both nations said in brief dispatches. His last visit was in June 2019.
The trip follows Mr Xi’s summits with US president Donald Trump and Russian president Vladimir Putin in quick succession in Beijing.
North Korea’s nuclear weapons programme has long been a major concern for the US, which opposes it. The UN has imposed economic sanctions on North Korea because of its nuclear and missile development.
The announcement of the trip came a day after North Korea unveiled a new facility to produce the ingredients for nuclear bombs. South Korea’s military has assessed the new nuclear facility as a uranium enrichment plant.
During a visit to the plant, Mr Kim announced plans to bolster the country’s nuclear forces “at an exponential rate”. Experts say the plant’s disclosure implies that Mr Kim is eager to cement his country’s status as a nuclear weapons state ahead of Mr Xi’s visit.
The experts say Mr Kim wants international recognition as a nuclear state so that he can demand the lifting of the sanctions. They say Mr Kim will ultimately push for arms reductions talks with the US to win concessions in return for a partial surrender of his nuclear capability.
Mr Kim has been focusing on expanding his nuclear arsenal since his high-stakes diplomacy with Mr Trump collapsed in 2019.
Mr Trump has repeatedly expressed his desire to restore diplomacy with Mr Kim, but the North Korean leader has said the US must first drop its demand for North Korea to denuclearise as a precondition for talks.
Mr Xi and Mr Kim met in Beijing in September and pledged mutual support and enhanced cooperation. Mr Kim was in the Chinese capital to attend a military parade alongside other foreign leaders.
Russia and China, both veto-wielding members of the UN Security Council, have previously frustrated the US and others’ efforts to toughen international sanctions on North Korea, despite its banned weapons tests.
At their meeting in Beijing last month, Mr Putin and Mr Xi expressed their opposition to “foreign policy isolation, economic sanctions, military pressure and other methods of creating threats to the security” of North Korea, according to a statement from the Kremlin.
Embracing the ideas of a “new Cold War” and a multipolar world, Mr Kim has pushed for a more assertive foreign policy by expanding ties with countries locked in confrontations with the US.
Mr Xi, who traveled widely in his first years in power, has curtailed his international trips sharply since the Covid pandemic. His last overseas trip was to South Korea last fall for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit, where he talked with Mr Trump.
