North Korea’s Kim Jong-un hosts banquet for Chinese diplomat as ‘flower garden’ friendship blooms once more
Reclusive leader says it is his obligation as a ‘close friend of Chinese President Xi Jinping’ to ensure ‘highest level of treatment’ for Song Tao and visiting arts troupe
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un met visiting senior Chinese diplomat Song Tao, Korean Central News Agency reported on Sunday, in a further sign of improving ties between Beijing and Pyongyang after Kim’s landmark visit to the Chinese capital last month.
The head of the Communist Party’s International Department, who is leading a visit by a Chinese troupe for the April Spring Friendship Art Festival in Pyongyang, was “warmly” welcomed by the reclusive leader on Saturday, KCNA said.
Kim also hosted a banquet for the Chinese delegation, during which officials from the two sides toasted their shared wish “to more beautifully decorate the flower garden” of bilateral friendship.
Photographs carried by the official Rodong Sinmun newspaper showed Chinese and North Korean officials seated at round tables in a massive banquet hall, with a mural of Kim and Xi shaking hands decorating one wall.
Another photograph showed a North Korean orchestra performing in front of a screen with a large image of Xi.