PYONGYANG WELCOMES MOSCOW'S EMBRACE, BUT THERE'S A CATCH

What kind of cooperation and support could the two leaders be referring to? One could be manpower.

- JOHN DOBSON

Is Vlad really snuggling up to Kim? Is this yet another sign of the international pariah, Vladimir Putin, reaching out to another dictator for friendship, having in February sealed one "without limits" with China's autocrat, Xi Jinping? Or is the cold and calculating Russian President after something?

As a result of Russia's estrangement over its continuing atrocities in Ukraine, President Vladimir Putin last week vowed to "expand Russia's comprehensive and constructive bilateral relations" with North Korea. In a letter to his counterpart, Kim Jong Un, on Pyongyang's liberation day, which marked the end of Japan's 1910-1945 colonial rule over the Korean peninsula, Putin claimed that the move would be in the interests of both countries. Replying, the North Korean despot said the Russian-North Korea friendship, which had been "forged in the anti-Japanese war" had been "consolidated and developed century after century", adding that "strategic and tactical cooperation, support and solidarity between the two countries have been put on a new high stage, in the common front for frustrating the hostile forces' military threat and provocation". Kim didn't identify the "hostile forces", but he was clearly referring to the US and its allies.