Chinese Premier Li Qiang will visit North Korea for celebrations marking the 80th anniversary of its ruling Workers¡¯ Party of Korea later this week, Beijing and Pyongyang announced Tuesday.
Li will head a Chinese delegation of party and government officials for an ¡°official friendly visit¡± from Thursday through Saturday, the Foreign Ministry in Beijing said, following an invitation by Pyongyang.
A delegation of Russia¡¯s United Russia Party, led by former President Dmitry Medvedev, is also scheduled to attend the celebrations, the North¡¯s official Korean Central News Agency reported earlier.
Meanwhile, China and South Korea¡¯s top diplomats held phone talks Tuesday, with Seoul expressing hope that Beijing¡¯s ties with Pyongyang ¡°develop in a way that contributes to the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula,¡± the South Korean Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
Friday¡¯s festivities in Pyongyang are expected to include a large-scale nighttime military parade, South Korean authorities have said. Such parades have typically been chances for the nuclear-armed North to showcase its array of powerful weapons systems, including long-range missiles capable of striking the United States.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un said late last month that his country had acquired new ¡°secret weapons.¡± That same month, Kim oversaw an engine combustion test for a next-generation Hwasong-20 intercontinental ballistic missile, and observers have said that ICBM could be rolled out for the parade.
The attendance by senior officials from Pyongyang¡¯s two top patrons will come just over a month after Kim joined Chinese leader Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin in Beijing for another military parade, as the three sought to showcase a willingness to more openly redefine the postwar U.S.-led global order.
Following that parade, Kim and Xi held their first in-person talks in six years, with the two agreeing to support one another ¡°no matter how the international situation may change.¡±
North Korea has ramped up its diplomatic outreach in recent months, sending a top official to speak before the United Nations General Assembly last month for the first time since 2018, while inviting the Vietnamese and Laotian leaders to join this week¡¯s festivities.
Kim has also signaled a willingness to reengage with the U.S. under President Donald Trump, albeit with a caveat. The North Korean leader has demanded that Washington first drop its long-standing demand that Pyongyang relinquish its nuclear weapons.
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