North Korean leader Kim Jong Un met with a senior Chinese official on Thursday as Pyongyang and Beijing move to strengthen their long-standing alliance.
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Wang Huning, a member of the Chinese Communist Party’s Politburo Standing Committee, led a delegation that arrived in the North Korean capital earlier this week, according to a Friday report from the North’s state-run KCNA news agency.
While China and North Korea maintain deep economic and security ties, their relationship has faced periods of strain. Pyongyang’s growing military cooperation with Russia has recently raised concerns in Beijing about its leverage on the Korean Peninsula.
Seeking to reassert its regional influence, China has intensified diplomatic engagement. President Xi Jinping visited Pyongyang in June, where he and Kim agreed to elevate bilateral relations.
Kim told Wang that the meeting underscored the importance of the two nations’ partnership, calling it North Korea’s “steadfast policy” to continue building “traditional friendly and cooperative relations” with China, KCNA reported.
In remarks on Thursday, Wang said Beijing would “deepen exchanges and mutual learning” with Pyongyang and pledged that both governments would work together to “promote peace and stability in the region and the world at large,” according to China’s state-run Xinhua news agency.
A Wednesday report from the Institute for the Study of War noted that North Korea has accelerated efforts to deepen ties with China in recent months, likely aiming to secure foreign currency and bolster its struggling economy.
North Korea remains one of the world’s most isolated nations. Its population of roughly 26 million faces widespread poverty and food shortages, largely cut off from the international community.
This isolation is often attributed to the state ideology of “Juche,” or self-reliance, which demands political independence and economic and military self-sufficiency.
