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North Korean leader Kim Jong-un and Chinese President Xi Jinping shake hands in Pyongyang on June 20.

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un did not meet with Chinese Foreign Minister and State Councilor Wang Yi during the latter’s visit to North Korea on Sept. 2–4. While it is not unheard-of for a North Korean top leader not to meet with a visiting Chinese foreign minister, it is quite rare. Kim did previously meet with Wang when he visited North Korea on May 2–4 of last year.

According to a Sept. 5 report in the Rodong Sinmun newspaper, Wang asked Workers’ Party of Korea Vice Chairman Ri Su-yong the day before to relay a message to Kim from Chinese President Xi Jinping expressing “warm greetings and tremendous hopes” – indirectly signaling that Kim did not actually meet with Wang.

It was not confirmed whether there had been any initial plans for Wang to meet with Kim during his North Korea visit. But when asked on Sept. 4 about whether the two were meeting, Geng Shuang, spokesperson for the Chinese Foreign Ministry, did not rule out the possibility.

“We will release information [. . .] in due course,” he said at the time.

Apart from an episode in October 1999 when then Chinese Foreign Minister Tang Jiaxuan did not meet with leader Kim Jong-il during his visit, no other examples of a meeting failing to take place had been recorded over the past 20 years.

Many analysts suggested that the signs of a long-term impasse in the Korean Peninsula situation – and considerations about strategies with the US in particular, including North Korea-US working-level talks – may have been a factor in Kim’s unexpected failure to meet with Wang. Their take was that Kim may have decided the timing and appearances were not appropriate for announcing anything to the outside amid his “late-stage battle of wills” and “intense blinking contest” with US President Donald Trump over the agenda and schedule for the working-level negotiations, which are expected to serve as a bellwether for a third North Korea-US summit. By offering a potential way out of the impasse, Kim would risk giving the appearance of “blinking first”; by making hardline remarks about the US, he would risk damaging his relationship of trust with Trump.

“Kim Jong-un is hanging everything on the nuclear negotiations and doesn’t have the luxury of helping Xi use the ‘North Korea card’ to reduce conflict with Trump,” said a former senior official closely acquainted with North Korea-China relations. “He just doesn’t have that much room for flexibility.”

But the South Korean government and experts generally agreed there was no reason to take the situation as a sign of trouble in relations between Pyongyang and Beijing. Following four visits to China by Kim since March of last year and a North Korea visit by Xi last June, interactions have been brisk enough that some are referring to a “new heyday” for North Korea-China relations. On Aug. 16–20, Kim Su-gil, who as chief of the People’s Army General Political Bureau ranks first in North Korea’s military hierarchy, visited China for “senior-level military talks” with Miao Hua, director of the Political Work Department of the Chinese Communist Party’s Central Military Commission; on July 15–20, Kang Yun-sok, president of North Korea’s Central Court, visited China to sign a memorandum of understanding on North Korea-China judicial cooperation. In their meeting on Sept. 4, Ri Su-yong proposed “elevating North Korea and China’s relationship of friendship and cooperation to a newer and higher stage,” to which Wang replied that China would “always be there as North Korea’s comrade and friend.” One South Korean veteran figure in the areas of foreign affairs and national security said, “There’s no read to place any great significance on Kim Jong-un not meeting with Wang Yi.”

Also raising interest is the question of whether Kim will visit China around the time of the 70th anniversary of the establishment of the “new China” on Oct. 1 or the 70th anniversary of North Korea-China relations on Oct. 6. A former senior official acquainted with the situation in North Korea-China relations said there was “a chance that Kim might visit China.”

“If he does go, he will probably meet with Xi and discuss the nuclear issue,” the former official predicted.

By Lee Jae-hoon, senior staff writer

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