The recent visit of Kim Jong-un, the North Korean leader to Russia and his meeting with Russia’s President Vladimir Putin, is important for two reasons. First, it was Kim’s first visit to Russia since he came to power. Of course, given the traditional relationship between the two countries, it was expected that the visit would take place sooner. However, the North Korean leader’s visit to Moscow could also affect bilateral relations at the current juncture. The other issue is the failure of the North Korea-US talks on Pyongyang’s nuclear disarmament; therefore, Kim’s visit to Russia was of great importance as it could have carried various messages to the United States; for example, the message that North Korea is not an isolated country. That is, contrary to what Americans have been doing in recent years to turn North Korea into an isolated political entity by imposing economic sanctions and political pressure, this trip virtually showed that North Korea is not only not isolated but has numerous foreign policy options, and if the process of negotiations with the United States does not proceed, Pyongyang can develop its relations with other powerful countries such as Russia.
The role played by the United States, especially under the administration of Donald Trump concerning negotiations with North Korea was more a dramatic show than finding a comprehensive solution and an all-out agreement. Trump tried to pretend to be the first actor in the international scene. Therefore, what mattered to Trump was the publicity aspect of the negotiations and the meetings with the North Korean leader. Hence, the Washington-Pyongyang talks have not made any significant progress due to the excessive demands and unilateralism of Washington to date. The Americans primarily want North Korea to be fully disarmed before they could lift the sanctions, which can virtually undermine North Korea’s security.
In the meantime, comparing the Russian and American perspectives on North Korean disarmament, it should be noted that the Russians, like the Americans, want to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons by others all over the world, and this does not merely relate to North Korea, but is a general policy and principle in Russian foreign policy. There is, therefore, a consensus between Russia and the United States, but there is serious disagreement as to how to reach a solution to this problem. While Americans want North Korea to stop all its activities at once, the Russians have proposed a step-by-step approach.
That is to say that in exchange for halting part of North Korea’s activities, a part of the sanctions would be lifted by the United States so that the parties could gradually achieve a comprehensive solution. Of course, this is not something the United States wants to achieve. Because Washington wants North Korea to unilaterally halt all its activities. Therefore, there is general agreement about North Korea’s disarmament between Russia and the United States, but there are differences of opinion on how to do this between the two countries.
On the other hand, the issue of North Korea’s disarmament depends to a large extent on the future of the Washington-Pyongyang negotiations. Given the fact that bilateral talks have virtually failed, and no significant progress has been made, it is likely that North Korea or even Russia will again seek to revive the Group 6, which had followed the negotiations with North Korea for six years between 2003 and 2009. Therefore, new initiatives and plans of this type may be proposed by different countries in the future. In this respect, the most important project that is likely to be raised is that countries such as Russia and China join the process of the talks with North Korea. If this happens the position of the United States will be weakened at the negotiation table and that of North Korea will be strengthened.
(The Six-Party talks included China, Japan, North Korea, Russia, South Korea, and the United States).