Russian Senators Ratify North Korean Defense Pact

A North Korean flag flies over its embassy in Moscow on October 31, 2024. (AFP)
A North Korean flag flies over its embassy in Moscow on October 31, 2024. (AFP)
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Russian Senators Ratify North Korean Defense Pact

A North Korean flag flies over its embassy in Moscow on October 31, 2024. (AFP)
A North Korean flag flies over its embassy in Moscow on October 31, 2024. (AFP)

Russian lawmakers on Wednesday voted unanimously to ratify a landmark mutual defense pact with North Korea, as Kyiv and the West say Pyongyang sent thousands of troops to fight for Russia against Ukraine.

The agreement formalizes months of deepening security cooperation between the two nations, which were Communist allies throughout the Cold War.

North Korea has become one of the most vocal and important backers of Russia's full-scale offensive on Ukraine.

The West has long accused Pyongyang of supplying artillery shells and missiles to Moscow to fire on Ukraine.

The latest accusations, based on intelligence reports, that North Korea has deployed around 10,000 troops to Russia suggest even deeper involvement in the conflict and have triggered an outcry and warnings in Seoul, Kyiv and Western capitals.

Ahead of the vote, presidential official Andrei Rudenko addressed the house, saying Moscow's relations with Pyongyang have reached new heights.

Rudenko praised North Korea for being the "only country in the world to publicly support" Russia's 2014 annexation of Crimea and 2022 annexation of eastern Ukraine following Moscow's full-scale offensive.

"I believe this treaty is very timely," he told the house.

The vote came as Donald Trump claimed a victory in the US presidential election.

- 'Mutual assistance' -

Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un signed the strategic partnership treaty in June, during the Kremlin chief's visit to Pyongyang.

They said it would obligate "mutual assistance in case of aggression", with Putin calling it at the time a "breakthrough document".

It also commits them to cooperate internationally to oppose Western sanctions and coordinate positions at the United Nations.

Putin visited Pyongyang this summer in his first trip to North Korea in 24 years.

Kim has called Putin his "closest comrade" while Foreign Minister Choe Son Hui said last week that North Korea would "stand firmly by our Russian comrades until victory day".

She called Moscow's offensive against Ukraine a "sacred struggle" and said Pyongyang believed in Putin's "wise leadership".

- 'Frontline' -

The treaty will now go back to Putin's desk for a final signature.

The ratification comes as North Korea faces growing international pressure not to send its troops into combat alongside Russia.

South Korea warned Tuesday that a substantial deployment was already near the combat zone, including in Russia's western Kursk region, where Kyiv has been mounting a cross-border offensive since the summer.

"More than 10,000 North Korean soldiers are currently in Russia, and we assess that a significant portion of them are deployed to frontline areas, including Kursk," Jeon Ha-gyu, a spokesman for the South Korean Defense Ministry, said Tuesday.

Asked directly about the reports last month, Putin did not deny that North Korean troops had been sent to Russia.

And several other Russian officials have deflected requests to comment on Western intelligence.

"The Kyiv regime is trying to do everything to involve Seoul" in the conflict, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Tuesday, refusing to comment on the substance of the allegations.

- Missile tests -

In exchange for sending troops, the West fears Russia is offering North Korea technological support that could advance Pyongyang's nuclear weapons program.

The reclusive state fired a salvo of short-range ballistic missiles early Tuesday, Seoul's military said, its second launch in days.

But sending North Korean troops to fight against Ukraine would be a major escalation in the conflict, more than two and a half years after Moscow launched its full-scale offensive.

Russia has seized the momentum on the battlefield this year as it grinds through the eastern Donbas region, capturing a string of towns and villages as Ukraine struggles with manpower and ammunition shortages.



China Will Work with US, Government Says, but More Rivalry Expected under Trump

China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesperson, Mao Ning, during a press conference on the US elections, in Beijing, China, 06 November 2024. (EPA)
China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesperson, Mao Ning, during a press conference on the US elections, in Beijing, China, 06 November 2024. (EPA)
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China Will Work with US, Government Says, but More Rivalry Expected under Trump

China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesperson, Mao Ning, during a press conference on the US elections, in Beijing, China, 06 November 2024. (EPA)
China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesperson, Mao Ning, during a press conference on the US elections, in Beijing, China, 06 November 2024. (EPA)

China will work with the US on the basis of mutual respect, it said on Wednesday as Donald Trump closed in on victory in the presidential election, but strategists said Beijing was bracing for bitter superpower rivalry over trade, technology and security issues.

"Our policy towards the US is consistent," Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesperson Mao Ning told a regular press conference in Beijing, when asked how Trump returning to the Oval Office would affect US-China relations.

"We will continue to view and handle China-US relations in accordance with the principles of mutual respect, peaceful co-existence and win-win cooperation," she added.

Chinese strategists however said they expected more fiery rhetoric and potentially crippling tariffs from Trump, although some said his isolationist foreign policy could give Beijing a vacuum to expand its global influence.

"Beijing anticipated a close race in the US election. Although Trump's victory is not China's preferred outcome and raises concerns, it is not entirely unexpected," said Tong Zhao, senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

"The Chinese leadership will likely strive to maintain an appearance of a cordial personal relationship with Trump, while intensifying efforts to project China's power and strength."

Da Wei, director of the Center for International Security and Strategy at Tsinghua University in Beijing, said Trump's victory "may pose a relatively large challenge to Sino-US relations" based on his campaign policy proposals and actions in his previous term.

"Due to Trump's high unpredictability, I think it is difficult for China to say that there is a fully formed plan to do "x" when Trump comes to power. It also depends on what policies the Trump administration implements."

TRUMP TARIFF THREAT

Trump has proposed tariffs on Chinese imports in excess of 60% and ending China’s most-favored-nation trading status, and analysts say the prospect of a trade war has rattled China's leadership.

China sells goods worth more than $400 billion annually to the US and hundreds of billions more in components for products Americans buy from elsewhere.

"Beijing is particularly wary of a potential revival of the trade war under Trump, especially as China currently faces significant internal economic challenges," said Zhao.

"China also expects Trump to accelerate the decoupling of technologies and supply chains, a move that could threaten China's economic growth and indirectly impact its social and political stability."

In response, China is likely to intensify its push for greater technological and economic self-sufficiency, while feeling more pressure to bolster economic ties with countries like Russia, he added.

"Going forward, Beijing would likely be drawing up a list of clear bargains and interest tradeoffs that it could float with Washington, in hope that it can focus on its much-needed domestic economic concerns whilst Trump's attention is occupied elsewhere," said Brian Wong, assistant professor at the University of Hong Kong who studies grand strategy.

GLOBAL POWER VACUUM

China is likely to shore up ties with the Global South, Europe and Northeast Asian countries in the event of a Trump win, given his "transactional, isolationist, anti-globalist and anti-multilateral foreign policy", said Wong.

Chinese President Xi Jinping and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi reached a rare rapprochement last month, while Beijing has tentatively reached out to the new Japanese administration this autumn following years of strained relations.

"China expects the second Trump administration to further disengage from international agreements and commitments, creating opportunities for China to expand its influence in emerging power vacuums," Zhao added.

Trump has unnerved democratically governed Taiwan by saying it should pay Washington for its defense and that it had taken US semiconductor business.

"The Biden administration applied high-pressure tactics to China on Taiwan, with US troops stationed in Taiwan and even giving weapons to Taiwan ... in a huge break with the former Trump administration's Taiwan policy," said Shen Dingli, an international relations scholar in Shanghai. Washington last month approved a US$2 billion arms sale to Taiwan.

"Trump is not too likely to give Taiwan the same support in future."