Russia and North Korea will provide each other military support “without delay” if either country is ever invaded, according to a new bilateral agreement reported by North Korean state media today. Russian President Vladimir Putin signed the deal on a state visit to North Korea yesterday before traveling on to Vietnam, where he signed a series of agreements on education, energy, health, and technology.
Japan, South Korea, and the secretary-general of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) voiced alarm over the Russia-North Korea deal, with Seoul warning that cooperation on military technology would violate UN Security Council resolutions. While the Russia-Vietnam deals were less substantial, a spokesperson for the U.S. Embassy in Hanoi responded to Putin’s visit by saying that “no country should give Putin a platform to promote his war of aggression and otherwise allow him to normalize his atrocities.” The United States upgraded its relations with Vietnam last year. (Yonhap, AP, FT, Reuters)
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