Kim courts China amid pressure over tests

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un dispatched a high-level confidant to Beijing yesterday in a possible effort to mend strained ties with his most important ally.

The move comes after months of North Korea ignoring Chinese warnings to give up nuclear weapons and could be a sign that Mr Kim may be giving diplomacy a chance,

The trip by vice-marshal Choe Ryong Hae, a senior North Korean Workers’ Party official and the military’s leading political officer, is taking place as tensions ease on the Korean Peninsula after threats from Mr Kim’s regime to attack America and its ally South Korea in March and April.

A number of countries have been busy discussing how best to engage with the North Korean leadership. Japan sent an envoy to Pyongyang last week to discuss decades-old abductions of its citizens, a move that has drawn concern among allies of Tokyo who want denuclearisation to be the focus of talks.

North Korea also revealed yesterday that a former defence minister, Kim Kyok-sik, has been promoted to chief of the Korean People’s Army in the latest of a series of high-level military reshuffles as Kim Jong-un elevates a new generation of military leaders.

Foreign analysts see vice-marshall Choe’s trip as part fence-mending mission, part appeal for aid.

The last high-level North Korea-China meeting took place when Chinese Communist Party chief Xi Jinping sent a politburo member to Pyongyang in November. Weeks later, North Korea launched a long-range rocket, followed by an underground nuclear test in February. That test, Pyongyang’s third, was met by more sanctions from the United Nations and America.

China has tightened inspections on cross-border trade in recent weeks and its state banks have halted business with North Korea’s Foreign Trade Bank.

“The North Korean side has been feeling China’s pressure,” said Ma Xiaojun, at the Central Party School, a think tank for the leadership in Beijing.