North Korea and Russia share close military and security relations. Both nations share interest in a geopolitical alignment in challenging the West. The two states share a border along the lower Tumen River, which is 17 kilometers (11 mi) long.
The Soviet Union occupied the northern part of the Korean Peninsula after the surrender of Japan in 1945. The Soviet Union was responsible for the creation of North Korea, and installed Kim Il Sung as the new nation's leader. After the proclamation of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea in 1948, the Soviet Union became the first country to recognize it as the sole legitimate authority in Korea. The Soviet Union supported North Korea during the Korean War. North Korea received major Soviet military and political support during the Cold War. The personality cult around North Korea's Kim family was heavily influenced by Stalinism. China and the Soviet Union competed for influence in North Korea after the Sino-Soviet split in the 1960s, leading North Korea to seek autonomy from both nations. In 1961, the North Korea and the Soviet Union signed a Treaty of Friendship, Cooperation and Mutual Assistance.
Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev began to reduce aid to the North after 1985, favoring closer ties with South Korea. After the dissolution of the Soviet Union, North Korea kept diplomatic ties with the Russian Federation, though ties stagnated under President Boris Yeltsin. Under President Vladimir Putin, the relationship initially deteriorated due to North Korea's nuclear program, which Russia opposed at the time. Russia condemned the 2006 North Korean missile test and supported sanctions against North Korea after subsequent nuclear tests. In 2012 Russia agreed to write off 90% of North Korea's debt to Russia. Relations started improving after 2018, with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un visiting Russia in 2019.
The two countries have grown significantly closer since the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine. In 2022, North Korea became the third country to recognise the independence of the breakaway states of Donetsk and Luhansk People's Republics in eastern Ukraine, leading Ukraine to terminate diplomatic ties. Beginning from September 2022, Russia reportedly purchased millions of shells and rockets from North Korea to aid in the war. In 2024, North Korea sent workers to Russia, which lacks workforce due to the war, and deployed troops into Kursk to support the Russian war effort. In the same year, North Korea and Russia signed the Treaty on Comprehensive Strategic Partnership, formalizing a defense treaty between the two nations. Russia in turn started providing technological, military and economic aid to North Korea, and dropped its opposition to the North Korean nuclear program.
Soviet Union
Soviet troops invaded the Japanese colony of Korea in 1945; by the agreement with the U.S., the 38th parallel was the dividing line with Moscow in charge to the north and Washington to the South. North Korea came under the control of the Soviet Civil Administration and People's Committee of North Korea from 1945 to 1948. In December 1945, the Soviets installed Kim as first secretary of the North Korean Branch Bureau of the Communist Party of Korea. As chairman of the committee, Kim was "the top Korean administrative leader in the North," though he was still de facto subordinate to Soviet General Terentii Shtykov until the Chinese intervention in the Korean War. On 10 July 1948, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) was officially established. On 12 October, the Soviet Union recognized the DPRK as the sovereign government of the entire peninsula, including the south.
Archival material suggests that North Korea's decision to invade South Korea was Kim's initiative, not a Soviet one. Evidence suggests that Soviet intelligence, through its espionage sources in the US government and British SIS, had obtained information on the limitations of US atomic bomb stockpiles as well as defense program cuts, leading Stalin to conclude that the Truman administration would not intervene in Korea. The Soviet 64th Fighter Aviation Corps took part in the Korean War where they provided North Korea and China with badly needed pilots. The Soviet Union had provided much support to North Korea during the Cold War. As part of the Communist bloc, North Korea received major Soviet military and political support during the Cold War.
In 1956, at the 2nd Plenary Session of the 3rd Central Committee, leading pro-China Korean figures known as the Yan'an faction attempted to remove Kim Il Sung from power with the support of China and the Soviet Union, but failed. This incident has become known as the August faction incident and forms the historical basis for North Korean fears of Chinese interference. A joint Soviet-Chinese delegation co-headed by Anastas Mikoyan and Peng Dehuai were sent to Pyongyang to instruct Kim Il Sung to cease any purge and reinstate the leaders of the Yan'an and Soviet factions in September 1956, leading Kim to backtrack partially.
In 1956, North Korea did not accept Nikita Khrushchev's program of de-Stalinization. Khrushchev promoted the concept of collective leadership, and the Soviet embassy in North Korea started advising Kim Il Sung to either give up his position as WPK leader or as premier. Kim wanted to retain both positions, but was prepared to yield one of the positions to a close ally; he recommended Choe Yong-gon to the Soviet embassy. However, by 1957, Kim started to advise the Soviet embassy against appointing Choe. Kim also proposed Kim Il, who had little political independence. Over the following months, Kim Il Sung and his allies Nam Il and Pak Chong-ae started investigating the degree of the demands by the Soviet embassy. Soviet ambassador Alexander Puzanov did not push hard on the issue of division of powers, including in a personal meeting with Kim. This eventually led Kim to directly ignored Soviet advice and stay on as premier. The Soviet Union did not intervene, highlighting declining Soviet influence in North Korea.
China and the Soviet Union competed for influence in North Korea during the Sino-Soviet split in the 1960s, as North Korea tried to maintain good relations with both countries, though also favoring autonomy from both. The 1961 DPRK-Soviet Union Treaty of Friendship, Cooperation and Mutual Assistance underpinned cooperation during the Cold War. After Khrushchev was replaced by Leonid Brezhnev in 1964, North Korea's relations with the Soviet Union became closer.
Moscow under Mikhail Gorbachev began to reduce aid to the North after 1985 in favor of reconciliation with South Korea. Military equipment continued to be provided until a last batch of MiG-29s was delivered in 1989. General Secretary Kim Il Sung visited the USSR five times, with the last time being in 1986 during the early Gorbachev era. He also met with Soviet officials abroad, including with Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev during the funeral of Yugoslav President Josip Broz Tito in May 1980.
Russian Federation
Under Boris Yeltsin
After the dissolution of the USSR, the new Russian government under Boris Yeltsin refused to provide support for North Korea, favoring South Korea instead.
The first meeting of the Inter-governmental Commission for Trade, Economic, and Scientific-Technical Cooperation between Russia and DPRK was held in the spring of 1996 led by Deputy Premier Vitali Ignatenko. This was the highest-level meeting (at the deputy prime ministerial level) between Moscow and Pyongyang since the collapse of the Soviet Union. During the visit, the two countries agreed to restore bilateral trade and economic cooperation to its 1991 level. The two sides also agreed to restore bilateral inter-governmental commissions and to establish working-level bodies between North Korea and the Russian Far Eastern province for bilateral cooperation in science-technology, forestry, light industry, and transport. Ignatenko carried Yeltsin's personal message to Kim Jong Il. In the message, Yeltsin expressed his hopes for tension reduction on the Korean peninsula and North Korea's continuing observance of the Armistice Agreement. Kim Jong Il, expecting that Gennady Zyuganov, the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, would win the coming presidential election in June–July 1996, did not even send a letter of reply, nor did he meet with the Russian delegation.
Since the mid-1990s, when it became apparent that South Korea would not become an important economic partner and that North Korea was not collapsing, Russia generally followed a strategy of diplomatic 'equidistance' between North and South Korea.
Under Vladimir Putin
Vladimir Putin's elevation to prime minister in August 1999 and then president in March 2000 had critical significance for Pyongyang, which attributed its previous grievances to Yeltsin's government. Kim Jong Il's references to Putin were to the effect that at last Russia had a leader "with whom to do business." However, intensive diplomatic work had to precede a historical breakthrough in Russia–DPRK relations. These efforts began to bear fruit in late 1998, and by March 1999, it became possible to agree completely on the text and the initial Treaty on Friendship, Good-Neighborly Relations and Cooperation. It was signed in February 2000, after Yeltsin left the political arena.
Starting in April 2000, covert preparations for a visit by President Putin to Pyongyang began. The first summit meeting in the history of Russian-Korean relations took place in July 2000 when a Joint Declaration was signed, the first international document signed by Kim Jong Il as General Secretary of the Workers' Party of Korea.
In April 2009, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov visited North Korea and signed a plan with Mun Jae-chol, acting chairman of the Korean Committee for Cultural Relations with Foreign Countries on 2009–2010 of cultural and scientific exchange.
In December 2010 the North Korean Minister of Foreign Affairs visited Moscow to meet his Russian counterpart, Lavrov, in what was seen as North Korea trying to control criticism about its attack on South Korea's Yeonpyeong island. Lavrov told the North Korean official that Pyongyang's November 23 artillery strike on Yeonpyeong island "resulted in loss of life" and "deserves condemnation".
On October 18, 2011, Russian and North Korean officials marked the 63rd anniversary of the establishment of bilateral diplomatic ties in an event at the North Korean embassy in Moscow. The evening's event was attended by Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexei Borodavkin.
A delegation of Russia's Federal Air Transport Agency (Rosaviatsia) visited Pyongyang from December 12 to 14, 2011. On December 13 (Tuesday) Rosaviatsia director Neradiko Alexandr and Kang Ki-sop, director of General Bureau of Civil Aviation signed an agreement on civilian search and rescue between Russia and North Korea.
After Putin won the 2012 Russian presidential election, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un congratulated him, writing in a letter "I wish you achievement in your responsible work for building a powerful Russia", expressing belief that the traditional bilateral relations of friendship and cooperation would grow stronger.
In May 2012 Russia appointed Aleksandr Timonin as the new ambassador to North Korea. The latter presented his credentials to Kim Yong-nam at the Mansudae Assembly Hall. On June 27, 2012, during the visit of the Deputy Foreign Minister of the DPRK Kung Seok-ung to Moscow, Foreign Ministries of both countries have signed an inter-ministerial plan of exchanges on 2013–2014. On June 5, 2012, the two sides concluded a Boundary Treaty between the two states.
In February 2014, during the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Krasnodar Krai, a delegation headed by president of the Presidium of the Supreme People's Assembly Kim Yong-nam travelled to represent North Korea, even though the latter did not participate in these Olympics. Kim had a meeting with President Putin, and also met a number of Russian parliamentarians and state officials in Moscow en route to the Games in Sochi. These included senators Valentina Matvienko and Ilyas Umakhanov of the Federation Council, Mikhail Margelov, the chair of the International Affairs Committee of the same body, and Vice Foreign Minister Igor Morgulov. Korean Central Television (KCTV) also introduced the opening ceremony of the Sochi Winter Olympics on the day it took place, the 8th, focusing on the presence of Kim Yong-nam.
North Korea recognizes the Russian annexation of Crimea in 2014. In October 2014, the new North Korean Foreign Minister, Ri Su-yong, made a ten-day visit to Russia. In November 2014 North Korean leader Kim Jong Un's special envoy, Choe Ryong-hae, made a seven-day visit to Russia. During his trip, he met with Russian President Vladimir Putin, delivering a letter to him from Kim Jong Un, and with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.
In April 2019, Kim travelled by armored train to Vladivostok to meet Putin, the first meeting between the two leaders. Kim Jong Un requested Russian leader Vladimir Putin's help in resolving a nuclear stalemate with the U.S.
Russo-Ukrainian war
In February 2022, Russia launched an invasion of Ukraine. On 2 March, North Korea was one of the five countries to vote against a United Nations resolution condemning the invasion. North Korea became the third country (the second being Syria) to recognise the independence of the breakaway states of Donetsk and Luhansk People's Republics in Eastern Ukraine. In response to the recognition, Ukraine terminated diplomatic ties with North Korea.