‘Axis of impunity’: Putin-Kim deal underlines new challenges to world order
Al Jazeera
Two leaders signed mutual defence pact during Russian president’s high-profile visit to North Korea, his first in 24 years.
Shortly after signing a new comprehensive strategic partnership between their two countries, Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un showed off their closer ties by going for a spin in a Russian-made Aurus limousine.
In a carefully choreographed public relations exercise, it was Putin who took the wheel first while Kim sat on the passenger side, grinning broadly. After Putin brought the car to a stop, a white-gloved aide opened the vehicle’s doors to allow the two men to swap seats.
Robert Dover, professor of intelligence and national security at the University of Hull in the United Kingdom, told Al Jazeera that photographs from the visit appeared to show “a genuine empathy” between Kim and Putin.
The two countries’ latest pact, which includes a mutual defence agreement, is a sign of just how far the relationship has come since Putin embarked on his full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
Where once Moscow, a veto-holding member of the United Nations Security Council, worked with the international community to rein in Pyongyang’s missile and nuclear weapons programmes, it now appears to be giving its explicit support to the world’s most-isolated regime.
