Russia-North Korea Ties: Treaty, Talks, Ukraine Link
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- Russia and North Korea signed a Comprehensive Strategic Partnership Treaty in 2024 and have since held three strategic dialogues, the most recent in late July in Moscow
- The Diplomat's Asia Geopolitics Podcast, hosted by Ankit Panda and Katie Putz, examined how transactional the Russia-North Korea partnership is
- The episode explored how sensitive the Moscow-Pyongyang relationship is to the Ukraine war
- China, which maintains its own nuanced relations with both North Korea and Russia, is examined for its perspective on the growing Moscow-Pyongyang closeness
Why it matters: Three strategic dialogues since the 2024 treaty — the latest in late July in Moscow — show the Russia-North Korea partnership is being actively operationalized beyond paper, while the podcast's framing ties its durability to Ukraine war outcomes, meaning Moscow's commitment to Pyongyang is at least partly conditional on battlefield realities.
