Pyongyang has the right to defend its sovereignty against the US, the Russian leader has said
Moscow and Pyongyang have agreed to support each other in the event of foreign aggression, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced on Wednesday during a visit to North Korea.
Putin and his North Korean counterpart, Kim Jong-un, signed a strategic partnership agreement that will serve as a blueprint for future cooperation in all areas, from cultural and tourism exchanges to trade, economic relations, and security, the Russian leader has said, calling it “truly a breakthrough.”
“The document on comprehensive partnership that we have signed today provides, among other things, for mutual aid in case of aggression against one of the participants,” the president added.
Moscow supports Pyongyang’s desire to protect its security and sovereignty from potential Western aggression, which is its right, Putin said. The country considers the US and its allies responsible for the rising tensions in the region, he added.
“Overused Western propaganda tropes can no longer hide their aggressive geopolitical intentions, including in Northwestern Asia,” Putin said.
Putin noted that Western nations were supplying advanced weapons to Ukraine and have given Kiev the green light to strike Russia. Under these circumstances, “Russia does not rule out the development of military cooperation with the DPRK under the document signed today.”
He denounced the “indefinite restrictions regime” imposed on North Korea by the UN Security Council, which includes an arms embargo, as “orchestrated by the US” and urged for it to be revised.
The Russian president had previously warned the West over Kiev’s desire to use donated weapons to conduct attacks deep inside Russia. Should that happen, Moscow could send similar types of weapons to enemies of the West, which could use them to strike the military assets of the US and its allies, he said earlier this month.
Pyongyang has an “objective and balanced” stance on the Ukraine conflict and sees its core causes, which proves North Korea’s independence and sovereignty, Putin said. The two nations are also on the same page in supporting “a more just and democratic multipolar world” that should replace the previous Western-centric system.
”We will continue to oppose the imposition of strangling sanctions, which the West has turned into a tool of maintaining its hegemony in politics, the economy and other areas,” the president vowed.
Recalling the long history of Russian cooperation with North Korea, Putin noted the role that the Soviet Union played in the fight against Imperial Japan during World War II and the reconstruction efforts following the Korean civil war, which split the Korean Peninsula between two rivals. Moscow was the party with which Pyongyang signed its first international agreement 75 years ago, he added.