According to North Korea’s state-controlled Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) on June 5, Chinese leader Xi Jinping will head to Pyongyang, the capital of North Korea, on June 8 for a summit meeting with North Korea’s autocratic leader Kim Jong Un. The visit was also confirmed by China’s state news agency, Xinhua.

It will be Xi’s first visit to Pyongyang since 2019, and just his second visit overall since coming to power in late 2012.

No details of Xi’s schedule during his two-day visit to Pyongyang have been released. When asked for the “program of the visit” in the daily press conference on June 5, Chinese Foreign Minister spokesperson Mao Ning merely replied that “the two top party and state leaders will exchange views on bilateral relations and issues of mutual interest.” 

Mao added, “The visit will be an opportunity for the two sides to work together to further advance bilateral ties in keeping with the times, promote the welfare of the two peoples, and contribute more to peace, stability, development and prosperity in the region and beyond.” More details, she said, would be released later.

The two leaders met on September 3 and 4 of last year in Beijing when Kim attended the commemoration event of the 80th anniversary of China’s victory in World War II. During that visit, Kim succeeded in securing his leverage by walking alongside Xi during the event. Xi seems to be visiting Pyongyang this time as a response to Kim’s visit last year. Their meeting will also celebrate the 65th anniversary of the Treaty of Friendship, Cooperation and Mutual Assistance between the two countries. 

The scheduled summit between Xi and Kim next week comes less than a month after Xi hosted U.S. President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin in quick succession. In this context, Xi’s visit to Pyongyang implies that he is now consolidating the anti-U.S. trilateral coalition with Russia and North Korea so that he can increase China’s influence over security dynamics in the East Asia region. 

On June 4, KCNA reported that Kim inspected a new nuclear material production facility. According to the state news agency, Kim emphasized again the necessity of bolstering his country’s nuclear capability and showed his firm will to continue to develop advanced nuclear missile programs. Although it is questionable whether Kim intentionally visited the newly launched nuclear material production facility prior to his summit with Xi, his gesture can be interpreted as a hardline approach to rule out the possibility that Beijing could take a role as a mediator on the Korean Peninsula. In other words, Pyongyang would want Beijing to formally recognize it as a nuclear state, following its amendment of constitution to legitimize its nuclear-building policy and frame itself as a nuclear state. 

As Pyongyang and Beijing move to strengthen their relationship, South Korean Unification Minister Chung Dong-young proposed a four-way peace dialogue involving South Korea, the United States, North Korea, and China during his address at the opening ceremony of the 11th Ulaanbaatar Dialogue on June 4. He also proposed that Mongolia, Japan, and Russia participate in the talks over time, adding that the trust-building process is necessary to move forward all together. 

With Chung’s remarks, the Unification Ministry also showed its hope that Xi’s visit to Pyongyang next week could contribute to advancing the peaceful coexistence of the two Koreas on the Korean Peninsula, and more broadly, in Northeast Asia. Since Pyongyang clearly expressed its antagonistic stance against Seoul even after South Korean President Lee Jae-myung pledged to respect the system of North Korea in March, however, it is unlikely that the Unification Ministry’s traditional approach to North Korea could bring Pyongyang back to the negotiating table.