How Kim Jong Un is building North Korea’s bargaining power for talks with US, South Korea

For Chinese President Xi Jinping, the meeting with Kim Jong Un ensures Beijing will not be left out of any deal struck between the United States and North and South Korea, experts said.

WORLD Updated: Mar 28, 2018 14:14 IST

Reuters, Beijing/Seoul

A woman walks past a TV broadcasting a news report on a meeting between North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing, in Seoul, South Korea.(Reuters Photo)

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s visit to China, countering what had been growing estrangement between the Cold War allies, is likely to bolster Pyongyang’s leverage going into a planned summit between Kim and US President Donald Trump.

For Chinese President Xi Jinping, the meeting with a long-troublesome neighbour ensures Beijing will not be left out of any deal struck between the United States and North and South Korea, experts said.

Months of frosty relations between Beijing and Pyongyang appeared suddenly to thaw with Kim’s secretive trip, which saw the Chinese capital go into security lockdown as the mysterious North Korean delegation toured the city.

China said Kim had pledged to denuclearise the Korean peninsula while North Korean state media said Xi had accepted “with pleasure” an invitation to visit the North.

Kim’s meeting with Xi strengthens North Korea’s negotiating position by aligning the two nations ahead of Trump and Kim’s planned meeting, said Wang Peng, a North Korea expert at the Charhar Institute in Beijing.

“North Korea is seeking assurances,” he said. “They want to quickly mend ties with China so that they have more leeway with the United States and they have more confidence in a good outcome.”