North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un on Wednesday led Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu through a tour of a “weaponry exhibition house” in Pyongyang reportedly showcasing intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) and other advanced arms.
Shoigu is in the country to mark the 70th anniversary of the armistice agreement that ended hostilities in the Korean War. North and South Korea – and allies China and America, respectively – fought the active portion of the Korean War between 1950 and 1953, but the armistice agreement featured no surrenders or peace provisions, meaning the Korean War remains technically an ongoing war. Despite this, North Korea marks the signing of the armistice as “Victory Day” and claims that it “won” the war.
Shoigu’s team and a partner delegation from China are the first high-profile foreign dignitaries invited to North Korea since the beginning of the Wuhan coronavirus pandemic in 2020. Kim ordered the closure of North Korea’s borders and largely banned travel into and out of the country for most of the past three years. In early July of this year North Korea’s communist state media published images of people not wearing sanitary masks for the first time since 2020.
In addition to marking an important occasion for the Kim regime, Shoigu’s visit appeared to be a test of his diplomatic abilities following an attempt to overthrow him by Yevgeny Prigozhin, the founder and leader of the Wagner Private Military Company (PMC), in late June. Prigozhin marched thousands of mercenaries out of Ukraine into Russia accusing Shoigu of having attacked his forces, but abruptly ended his mutiny less than a day later, retreating to Belarus under the auspices of its dictator, Alexander Lukashenko. Shoigu has kept a low profile since the mutiny, which Prigozhin directly blamed him for what occurred.
Kim Jong-un personally greeted Shoigu and scheduled a tour with him of a weaponry exhibition house in North Korea’s capital, according to the regime’s state newspaper Rodong Sinmun. The newspaper described their exchange as “friendly” and brimming with “militant comradeship.” Shoigu offered Kim a personal letter written to him by Russian strongman Vladimir Putin.
“Kim Jong Un, together with Sergei Shoigu, looked round the new-type weapons and equipment,” Rodong Sinmun detailed. “Telling the Russian defence minister about the weapons and equipment which were invented and produced … Kim Jong Un shared with Sergei Shoigu comments on the worldwide trend of weaponry development and its strategy.”
Kim and Shoigu reportedly discussed “issues of mutual concern in the struggle to safeguard the sovereignty, development and interests of the two countries from the high-handed and arbitrary practices of the imperialists,” a term typically used to refer to America. Rodong Sinmun claimed the two also discussed “international justice” and Kim predicted Russia would “achieve big successes in the struggle for building a powerful country.”
Shoigu, in turn, reportedly called North Korea “the strongest army in the world.”
Voice of America, citing the images of the tour in the North Korean state newspaper, reported that Kim showed Shoigu homemade ICBMs and other advanced military machinery.
“The weaponry exhibition house featured intercontinental ballistic missiles and new unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), images showed,” Voice of America reported. “Observers in Seoul noted the UAVs appeared similar to the American-made Global Hawk, a remotely piloted high-altitude surveillance aircraft, and the MQ 9 Reaper, a hunter-killer UAV.”
North Korea has invested heavily in the development of the weapons, which are believed to be capable of carrying nuclear warheads and potentially allowing Pyongyang to stage a nuclear attack against the United States. The latest model North Korea claims to have developed was tested in mid-July. Named the Hwasong-18, North Korea claimed it was a solid-fuel missile, which would allow it to launch with less time to prepare than a liquid-fuel model, giving the target less time to prepare. United Nations officials said in a Security Council meeting following the test that the Hwasong-18 appeared capable of hitting “most points on Earth.”
Voice of America did not identify the model ICBMs present for the exhibition Shoigu attended, but Japan’s Kyodo News claimed they appeared to be Hwasong-18s.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, right, and his daughter inspect the site of a missile launch at Pyongyang International Airport in Pyongyang, North Korea, Friday, Nov. 18, 2022. North Korea’s state media said its leader Kim oversaw the launch of the Hwasong-17 missile, a day after its neighbors said they had detected the launch of an ICBM potentially capable of reaching the continental U.S. (Korean Central News Agency/Korea News Service via AP)
Russia, a permanent member of the Security Council, has often prevented the Council from acting against North Korea’s illegal nuclear weapons development. During the emergency meeting two weeks ago, the Russian representative justified Pyongyang’s belligerence by claiming that South Korea and Japan staging military exercises with America were “provocations” responsible for North Korea’s actions.
Kyodo News noted that Kim Jong-un offering Shoigu such personal attention, in particular a tour of its advanced weapons, was “rare” and a sign that relations between Moscow and Pyongyang were warm. Shoigu also received the honor of being the first foreign dignitary to meet with Kim since before the Wuhan coronavirus pandemic. Kim’s last in-person engagement with a top foreign official was his meeting with former President Donald Trump on the border between the two Koreas in 2019, where Trump became the first American president in history to step on North Korean soil.
Kim hosted both the Russian and Chinese delegations for an event at midnight local time on Thursday – a concert to honor “Victory Day.”
“The performance venue was overflowing with the great pride and self-confidence of significantly greeting the war victory day, the holiday of the [North Korea] and all its people,” Rodong Sinmun narrated, “with the priceless honor and dignity offered by the victory in the three-year war and the 70-year-long indomitable struggle for preserving that victory.” Concertgoers enjoyed several popular North Korean hits such as “The People Offer Glory to the Party,” “To a Decisive Battle,” and the “immortal hymn” “Cantata to Marshal Kim Il Sung.”