Russian President Vladimir Putin shakes hands with North Korean Foreign Minister Choe Son Hui during their meeting at the Kremlin in Moscow, Russia, on Monday, Oct. 27, 2025.
| Photo Credit: AP

Seoul:

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un pledged to solidify the country’s comprehensive strategic partnership with Russia in his letter to President Vladimir Putin on Monday, state media KCNA reported on Tuesday.

In the message, Kim sent New Year greetings to Putin and all Russians, including their troops and expressed his willingness to further step up bilateral ties, which he said the two leaders have elevated to a new height this year, through new projects, KCNA said.

Kim “wished that the New Year 2025 would be recorded as the first year of victory in the 21st century when the Russian army and people would defeat neo-Nazism and achieve a great victory,” KCNA said.

Kim and Putin signed a mutual defence treaty at a summit in June, which calls for each side to come to the other’s aid in case of an armed attack.

North Korea has since dispatched tens of thousands of troops to Russia to support its war against Ukraine, and Seoul and Washington said that more than a thousand of them have been killed or wounded.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

A Russian strike on a nine-story building in the city of Sumy in northern Ukraine killed eight people and wounded dozens, an official said Sunday (November 17, 2024), as Russia launched a massive drone and missile attack described by officials as the largest in recent months.

“Among the eight killed in Sumy, 40 kilometers (24 miles) from the border with Russia, were two children,” said Ukraine’s Minister of Internal Affairs Ihor Klymenko. More than 400 people were evacuated from the building.

The rescuers were checking every apartment looking for people who might be still in the damaged building.

“Every life destroyed by Russia is a big tragedy,” said Mr. Klymenko.

The drone and missile attack, which targeted Ukraine’s energy infrastructure, came as fears are mounting about Moscow’s intentions to devastate Ukraine’s power generation capacity ahead of the winter.

Also Sunday (November 17, 2024), President Joe Biden authorized for the first time the use of U.S.-supplied long-range missiles by Ukraine to strike inside Russia, after extensive lobbying by Ukrainian officials.

The weapons are likely to be used in response to North Korea’s decision to send thousands of troops to support Russia in the Kursk region where Ukraine mounted a military incursion over the summer.

It is the second time the U.S. has permitted the use of Western weapons inside Russian territory within limits after permitting the use of HIMARS systems, a shorter-range weapon, to stem Russia’s advance in Kharkiv region in May.

The first reaction from Ukraine to the long-awaited decision from the U.S. was notably restrained.

“Today, much is being said in the media about us receiving permission for the relevant actions. But strikes are not made with words. Such things are not announced. The missiles will speak for themselves,” said Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in his nightly video address.

Earlier, Mr. Zelenskyy said that Russia had launched a total of 120 missiles and 90 drones in a large-scale attack across Ukraine. Various types of drones were deployed, he said, including Iranian-made Shaheds as well as cruise, ballistic, and aircraft-launched ballistic missiles.

Ukrainian defenses shot down 144 out of a total of 210 air targets, Ukraine’s air force reported later on Sunday.

“The enemy’s target was our energy infrastructure throughout Ukraine. Unfortunately, there is damage to objects from hits and falling debris. In Mykolaiv, as a result of a drone attack, two people were killed and six others were injured, including two children,” Mr. Zelenskyy said.

Two more people were killed in the Odesa region, where the attack damaged energy infrastructure and disrupted power and water supplies, said local Gov. Oleh Kiper. Both victims were employees of Ukraine’s state-owned power grid operator, Ukrenergo, the company said hours later.

The combined drone and missile attack was the most powerful in three months, according to the head of Kyiv’s City Military Administration, Serhii Popko.

One person was injured after the roof of a five-story residential building caught fire in Kyiv’s historic center, according to Popko.

A thermal power plant operated by private energy company DTEK was “seriously damaged,” the company said.

Russian strikes have hammered Ukraine’s power infrastructure since Moscow’s all-out invasion of its neighbor in February 2022, prompting repeated emergency power shutdowns and nationwide rolling blackouts. Ukrainian officials have routinely urged Western allies to bolster the country’s air defenses to counter assaults and allow for repairs.

Explosions were heard across Ukraine on Sunday (November 17, 2024), including in the capital, Kyiv, the key southern port of Odesa, as well as the country’s west and central regions, according to local reports.

The operational command of Poland’s armed forces wrote on X that Polish and allied aircraft, including fighter jets, have been mobilized in Polish airspace because of the “massive” Russian attack on neighboring Ukraine. The steps were aimed to provide safety in Poland’s border areas, it said.

Russia’s Defense Ministry on Sunday (November 17, 2024) acknowledged carrying out a “mass” missile and drone attack on “critical energy infrastructure” in Ukraine but claimed all targeted facilities were tied to Kyiv’s military industry.

Although Ukraine’s nuclear plants were not directly impacted, several electrical substations on which they depend suffered further damage, the U.N.’s nuclear energy watchdog said in a statement Sunday. According to the International Atomic Energy Agency, only two of Ukraine’s nine operational reactors continue to generate power at full capacity.

A local journalist died Sunday (November 17, 2024) as Ukrainian drones struck Russia’s embattled Kursk region, its Gov. Aleksei Smirnov reported.

Moscow’s forces have for months strained to dislodge Ukrainian troops from the southern province after a bold incursion in August that constituted the largest attack on Russia since World War II and saw battle-hardened Ukrainian units swiftly take hundreds of square miles (kilometers) of territory.

In Russia’s Belgorod province, near Ukraine, a man died on the spot after a Ukrainian drone dropped explosives on his car, local Gov. Vyacheslav Gladkov reported.

Another Ukrainian drone on Sunday targeted a drone factory in Izhevsk, deep inside Russia, according to anti-Kremlin Russian news channels on the Telegram messaging app. The regional leader, Aleksandr Brechalov, reported that a drone exploded near a factory in the city, blowing out windows but causing no serious damage. “A man was briefly hospitalized with a head injury,” Brechalov said.

Seoul:

Russian President Vladimir Putin said he plans to lift relations with North Korea to a higher level and pledged his unwavering support, Pyongyang’s state media KCNA reported on Tuesday ahead of his planned visit to the country.

In a letter published in North Korea’s Rodong Sinmun, a ruling Workers’ Party mouthpiece, Putin said the two countries have developed good relations and partnerships over the past 70 years based on equality, mutual respect and trust.

Putin thanked North Korea for supporting what Russia calls its special military operation in Ukraine, and vowed support for Pyongyang’s efforts to defend its interests despite what he called “U.S. pressure, blackmail and military threats.”

The article was published a day after the two countries announced that Putin will visit North Korea for the first time in 24 years for two days starting on Tuesday.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov attend the talks in Pyongyang, North Korea, on October 19, 2023.
Photo: Russian Foreign Ministry Press Service telegram channel via AP

Russia’s Foreign Minister proposed regular security talks with North Korea and China to deal with what he described as increasing U.S.-led regional military threats, as he met North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and his top diplomat on October 19 during a visit to Pyongyang.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov arrived in North Korea’s capital on October 20 on a two-day trip expected to focus on how to boost the two countries’ defence ties following a September summit between Mr. Kim and Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Last week, the United States said North Korea had transferred munitions to Russia to boost its fighting capabilities in Ukraine in violation of U.N. Security Council resolutions that ban any weapons trading involving North Korea.

On October 19, Mr. Lavrov met Mr. Kim for talks that lasted about an hour, Russia’s state-run Tass news agency reported, without elaborating. Mr. Lavrov met his North Korean counterpart, Choe Son Hui, earlier on October 19 and lauded deepening bilateral cooperation.

The Lavrov-Kim meeting “means that the recent fleet of containers likely caring munitions from North Korea to Russia was not the last Kim-Putin transaction the world has to worry about,” said Leif-Eric Easley, a professor of international studies at Ewha University in Seoul.

“After accepting Pyongyang’s help to resupply the illegal invasion of Ukraine, Moscow is set to commit further violations of U.N. Security Council resolutions by providing North Korea with weapons technology that could threaten stability in East Asia,” Mr. Easley said.

More details of Mr. Lavrov’s meetings with Mr. Kim and Ms. Choe weren’t immediately available. But Tass quoted Mr. Lavrov as telling reporters that he supports holding regular talks on security issues on the Korean Peninsula with North Korea and China.

“The United States, Japan and South Korea intensifying military activity here and Washington working toward moving strategic infrastructure, including nuclear aspects, here, are of great concern to us and our North Korean friends,” Mr. Lavrov said, according to Tass. “We oppose this unconstructive and dangerous policy with a course toward de-escalation and inadmissibility of escalating tensions here.”

The recent flurry of diplomacy between Russia and North Korea underscores how their interests are aligning in the face of their separate, intensifying confrontations with the United States — North Korea over its advancing nuclear program and Russia over its war with Ukraine.

The U.S. has been expanding regular military drills with South Korea and temporarily deploying more powerful military assets around the Korean Peninsula in response to North Korea’s barrage of missile tests since last year. The U.S. and South Korea have also resumed some trilateral military exercises with Japan.

The focus of outside attention during Mr. Lavrov’s visit is whether the two countries will provide any hints of how they will solidify their security cooperation or announce the timing of Mr. Putin’s promised trip to Pyongyang to reciprocate Mr. Kim’s visit to Russia’s Far East.

During his travel to Russia, Mr. Kim met Mr. Putin at the Vostochny Cosmodrome, Russia’s most important domestic space launch centre, and inspected other key Russian weapon-making sites. That triggered intense speculation that Mr. Kim seeks sophisticated Russian technologies to modernize his nuclear arsenal in return for supplying conventional arms to refill Russia’s declining weapons inventory. Neither Russia nor North Korea has disclosed what Mr. Putin and Mr. Kim agreed to during the summit.

“After the historic summit between President Putin and Chairman of State Affairs Kim Jong Un at the Vostochny Cosmodrome on September 13, we can confidently say that the relations have reached a qualitatively new strategic level,” Mr. Lavrov said at the start of his meeting with Ms. Choe, according to Russia’s state-run Interfax news agency.

Ms. Choe said her meeting with Mr. Lavrov “will become an important stage in terms of the implementation of the agreements” reached by Mr. Kim and Mr. Putin, Tass said.

During a dinner banquet held for him on October 18, Mr. Lavrov said Russia deeply values North Korea’s “unwavering and principled support” for its war on Ukraine as well as Pyongyang’s decision to recognize the independence of Russian-backed separatist regions in eastern Ukraine, according to Russia’s Foreign Ministry.

North Korean state media said Mr. Lavrov also praised North Korea for “remaining unfazed by any pressure of the U.S. and the West,” and said that Russia fully supports Mr. Kim’s push to protect its security and economic interests. Ms. Choe said Pyongyang and Moscow were building an “unbreakable comradely relationship” under the leadership of Mr. Kim and Mr. Putin.

The White House said Friday that North Korea had delivered more than 1,000 containers of military equipment and munitions to Russia. The White House released images that it said showed the containers were loaded onto a Russian-flagged ship before being moved via train to southwestern Russia.

Also Read: U.S. imposes sanctions on North Korean, Russian accused of supporting North Korea’s ballistics missile program

Since last year, the U.S. has accused North Korea of providing ammunition, artillery shells and rockets to Russia, likely much of them copies of Soviet-era munitions. North Korea has steadfastly denied it shipped arms to Russia, but South Korean officials said North Korean weapons provided to Russia have already been used in Ukraine.

Lim Soosuk, spokesperson of South Korea’s Foreign Ministry, told reporters on October 19 that Seoul was closely monitoring Mr. Lavrov’s visit to North Korea and that any cooperation between Moscow and Pyongyang should be conducted in a way that complies with U.N. Security Council resolutions.

When asked whether Mr. Lavrov’s comments stating that Russia fully supports Mr. Kim’s policies could be interpreted as an acceptance of North Korea’s nuclear weapons status, Mr. Lim insisted that the North “no matter what it does, will never be recognized as a nuclear power and will face increasing international sanctions.”