As Kim Jong-un arrived at the Vladivostok railway station on Wednesday, white-gloved attendants ran alongside his armoured train, wiping the dust from any surfaces that the North Korean leader might touch exiting the carriage.
Before he could disembark, the train had to back up precisely so that the carriage doors lined up with the red carpet laid out for Kim’s arrival.
So began Kim’s highly anticipated two-day visit to Russia for his first summit with the Russian president, Vladimir Putin. The journey by rail echoed one made by Kim’s father, Kim Jong-il, who met Putin in Vladivostok in 2002 and once travelled more than 12,000 miles round-trip to Moscow on the same train.
“I have heard a lot of good things about your country and wanted to visit it for a long time,” Kim said hours earlier at the Khasan border crossing, according to the regional administration. “Seven years have passed since I took charge of the country, but I did not have a chance to visit Russia until now.”
Kim, dressed in a black overcoat and fedora hat, was met by members of the Kremlin administration. He is expected to tour Vladivostok on Wednesday and then prepare for the summit with Putin to be held on Thursday on the island campus of the Far Eastern University.
North Korea is seeking diplomatic support in its negotiations with the US over its nuclear programme, and material support for its sanctions-hit economy. Russia opposes the west’s sanctions-led approach but also, like China, wants to see North Korea roll back its nuclear efforts. Putin is expected to propose modest financial support, because Russia will not openly flout the economic sanctions and sees North Korea as a questionable investment.
The trip comes just two months after a failed summit in Hanoi between Kim and Donald Trump yielded no results.
Kim told Russian television from Vladivostok that he wanted to discuss the “problem of the Korean peninsula” and bilateral relations with Putin.
He then sped off in a limousine brought to Vladivostok for his visit, as a retinue of bodyguards jogged alongside.
