MOSCOW (AP) — Russian President Vladimir Putin hosted a meeting Friday with his Belarusian ally, who suggested that Minsk could join Moscow’s efforts to maintain an old alliance with Pyongyang after a summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un this week to revive.
Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko made the suggestion during his meeting with Putin in the Black Sea resort of Sochi, where the Russian leader said he would brief him on talks with Kim on Wednesday at the Vostochny cosmodrome in the Russian Far East.
“I would like to inform you about the discussion on the situation in the region, which was very important, and also touch on the most topical issue, the situation in Ukraine,” Putin said at the start of the meeting.
Lukashenko responded that “we could think about triangular cooperation,” adding: “I think a bit of work could be found for Belarus there too.”
Kim continued his trip on Friday with a visit to an aircraft factory in Komsomolsk-on-Amur to see the latest Russian fighter jets. He is scheduled to arrive in the Russian port of Vladivostok on Saturday, where he is expected to tour warships of the Russian Pacific Fleet and visit a university.
The U.S. and its allies believe Kim is likely to supply munitions to Russia for use in Ukraine in return for advanced weapons or technology from Moscow – a deal that would violate U.N. sanctions on Pyongyang. which ban all arms trade with North Korea.
Putin said after the meeting with Kim that Russia would abide by U.N. sanctions and reiterated that commitment on Friday.
“We never violate anything, and in this case we have no intention of violating anything,” he told reporters. “But we will definitely look for opportunities to further develop Russian-North Korean relations.”
Putin’s meeting with Lukashenko was their seventh this year. Lukashenko, who has relied on Russian subsidies and political support for nearly three decades to rule the former Soviet country with an iron hand, allowed the Kremlin in February 2022 to use Belarusian territory to send troops to Ukraine.
While Belarus has continued to deploy Russian troops, Lukashenko stressed that his country would not join the fighting.
“Lukashenko shows that Belarus just wants to be a military center for Russia and profit from it to compensate for the closure of Western markets and sanctions, but it does not want to send its soldiers to Ukraine to die there,” said Belarusian analyst Valery Karbalevich.
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Associated Press writer Yuras Karmanau contributed in Tallinn, Estonia.