One month before the second anniversary of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the diplomatic agenda is busy for the two warring parties. This Sunday, January 14, French Foreign Minister Stéphane Séjourné is going to Berlin to advance the Ukrainian file for European integration. For its part, Russia will receive, from Monday January 15, the North Korean Minister of Foreign Affairs, whose country is suspected of supporting the delivery of arms to Moscow.
Information to remember
⇒ Choe Son Hui, head of North Korean diplomacy, will visit Russia this week
⇒ Stéphane Séjourné, new Minister of Foreign Affairs, visits Germany and Poland
⇒ Russia struck Ukrainian arms factories
North Korean foreign minister visits Russia
North Korea’s foreign minister will visit Russia next week, official North Korean media reported on Sunday, as Washington and its allies condemned alleged arms transfers from Pyongyang to Moscow for its war in Ukraine . “Choe Son Hui, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea’s official name), will pay an official visit to the Russian Federation from January 15 to 17 at the invitation of his Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov,” the KCNA news agency said.
Russia and North Korea, long-time allies, have shown a rapprochement since North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s trip to the Russian Far East in September 2023 to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin. Senior Russian officials, including defense and foreign ministers, also visited North Korea last year, fueling concerns about a possible arms deal.
In early January, the White House accused North Korea of transferring ballistic missiles and launchers to Russia, which it called a “significant and worrying escalation” of its support for the effort. Moscow war. South Korea also suspects Pyongyang of supplying more than a million artillery shells to Moscow in exchange for technological help for its military satellites.
France wants to advance Ukrainian integration into Europe
The head of French diplomacy, Stéphane Séjourné, in Kiev on Saturday January 13, is going to Germany this Sunday and to Poland on Monday to meet his counterparts and advance Ukrainian issues within European bodies, his entourage told AFP .
Stéphane Séjourné will meet Annalena Baerbock at 4 p.m. then return to Paris for meetings. He will then return to Warsaw to meet with Szymon Szynkowski at 6:30 p.m. the next day. “He listened to Ukrainian needs” and intends to discuss them before the European Council on February 1, we learned from the same source.
The head of French diplomacy assured Saturday in kyiv, a few hours after the Russian strikes, that Ukraine would remain “France’s priority”, promising his unfailing support “despite the multiplication of crises”. “Russia hopes that Ukraine and its supporters will give up before it does. We will not weaken,” said Stéphane Séjourné, at a press conference with his Ukrainian counterpart Dmytro Kouleba, on the occasion of his first official visit as head of French diplomacy.
Paris, he said, will weigh “with all its weight” so that kyiv obtains a European aid package of 50 billion euros, for the moment blocked by Hungary’s veto.
Moscow hits arms factories
This trip comes as the Ukrainian air force accused Russia on Saturday January 13 of having launched dozens of missiles and drones on Ukraine during the night from Friday to Saturday. It claims that eight missiles were destroyed and that 20 devices “did not reach their target”, diverted by “electronic countermeasures”, out of a total of 40 projectiles.
The Russian army, for its part, claimed to have struck arms factories, claiming to have hit, with Kinjal hypersonic missiles, “all” of its targets among installations of the Ukrainian “military-industrial complex” manufacturing shells, drones and gunpowder. cannon.