MOSCOW (Reuters) – President Vladimir Putin held a phone call with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and updated him on planned talks the Russian leader will hold with U.S. President Donald Trump in Alaska this week, the Kremlin said on Tuesday.
North Korea’s state news agency KCNA later reported the two leaders’ call without mentioning the meeting scheduled on Friday between Putin and Trump.
Kim and Putin discussed the development in the countries’ ties under a strategic partnership agreement signed last year “confirming their will to strengthen cooperation in the future,” KCNA said.
Putin expressed appreciation for North Korea’s help in “liberating” the Kursk region in western Russia in the war against Ukraine and “the bravery, heroism and self-sacrificing spirit displayed by service personnel of the Korean People’s Army,” it said.
North Korea has dispatched more than 10,000 troops to support Russia’s campaign in western Russia in the Ukraine conflict and is believed to be planning another deployment, according to a South Korean intelligence assessment.
(Reporting by Reuters, Jack Kim, Writing by Felix Light; Editing by Gareth Jones and Stephen Coates)
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