North Korea launched multiple short-range ballistic missiles toward the East Sea on Tuesday, South Korea's military said, in a provocation staged just days before US President-elect Donald Trump takes office.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Saturday stated that the Ukrainian security forces have captured two North Korean military personnel in the Kursk region amid the ongoing conflict between Russia and Ukraine.
North Korea on Saturday lambasted a recent trilateral meeting between South Korea, the US and Japan that discussed peace in the Indo-Pacific region, deriding the talks as an "insult" to peace.
A Ukrainian media outlet has reported that about 500 North Korean soldiers were killed in a missile strike by Kyiv in Russia's western Kursk region.
The powerful sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un said on Sunday that South Korea will have to pay a "dear price" for sending propaganda leaflets across the border the previous day.
For both China and North Korea, history has been etched in stone, and it cannot be overshadowed by the contretemps of geopolitics.
Xi's plane left Pyongyang's Sunan International Airport in the afternoon. He had arrived in Pyongyang early Thursday, becoming the first Chinese head of state to visit the North in 14 years, reports Yonhap News Agency.
Xi is the first Chinese president to visit North Korea in 14 years after relations between the Cold War era allies deteriorated over Pyongyang's nuclear provocations and Beijing's subsequent backing of UN sanctions.
The visit comes as nuclear negotiations between Kim and US President Donald Trump have soured after the second summit in February broke up without a deal, failing to agree on what Pyongyang would be willing to give up in exchange for sanctions relief.
A possible summit between Abe and Kim would attempt to comprehensively address the denuclearisation issue, including the abduction of Japanese nationals, and would be in line with meetings between South Korea and North Korea, and that between the United States and North Korea. However, there has been no clarity in Japan on the breakthrough it could expect from a summit if it materialises. Fearing diplomatic isolation and to stay relevant in an age of fast-moving diplomacy with Pyongyang, one notices a potential shift in Japan's diplomacy by neither confirming nor denying its seriousness of seeking a summit with Kim.
