North Korean leader Kim reaffirms support for Russia in Ukraine conflict

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un told Russia's top diplomat his country was ready to "unconditionally support" Moscow's every effort to resolve the conflict in Ukraine, state media reported on Sunday, as the two countries held high-level strategic talks.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov was on a three-day visit to North Korea, which has provided troops and arms for Russia's war with Ukraine and pledged more military support as Moscow tries to make advances in the conflict.

Kim met Lavrov in the eastern coastal city of Wonsan where the two countries' foreign ministers held their second strategic dialogue, pledging further cooperation under a partnership treaty signed last year that includes a mutual defense pact.

Kim told Lavrov the steps taken by the allies in response to radically evolving global geopolitics will contribute greatly to securing peace and security around the world, North Korea's state news agency KCNA reported.

"Kim Jong Un reaffirmed the DPRK (Democratic People's Republic of Korea) is ready to unconditionally support and encourage all the measures taken by the Russian leadership as regards the tackling of the root cause of the Ukrainian crisis," KCNA said.

Lavrov earlier held talks with his North Korean counterpart Choe Son Hui in Wonsan, and they issued a joint statement pledging support to safeguard the national sovereignty and territorial integrity of each other's country, KCNA said.

On Saturday, Russian media reported Lavrov described the two countries' ties as "an invincible fighting brotherhood" in his meeting with Kim and thanked him for the troops deployed to Russia.

Relations between Russia and North Korea have deepened dramatically during the last two years of the war in Ukraine, which started in February 2022, with Pyongyang deploying more than 10,000 troops and arms to Russia to back Moscow's military campaign.

On Sunday, the intelligence arm of South Korea's Defence Ministry reported to parliament that North Korea continued to supply artillery ammunition to Russia and has so far shipped about 12 million rounds, Yonhap news said.

The Defense Intelligence Agency, which made the report, could not be reached for confirmation.

An earlier estimate of artillery and rocket launcher ammunition was around 9 million rounds by a group of 11 UN member countries set up to track North Korea's violation of past UN Security Council resolutions.

Kim's government has pledged to send about 6,000 military engineers and builders to help reconstruction work in Russia's Kursk region.