Why Russia is protecting North Korea from nuclear monitors

Through the most tense encounters with President Vladimir V Putin's Russia over the past decade, there has been one project in which Washington and Moscow have claimed common cause: keeping North Korea from expanding its arsenal of nuclear weapons.

Now, even that has fallen apart.

Russia on Thursday vetoed the annual renewal of a panel of experts monitoring enforcement of longstanding United Nations sanctions against North Korea over its nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programmes.

Russia said on Friday that major powers needed a new approach to North Korea, accusing the United States and its allies of ratcheting up military tensions in Asia and seeking to "strangle" the reclusive state.

Moscow's move, which strikes a blow at the enforcement of a myriad of UN sanctions imposed after Pyongyang carried out its first nuclear test in 2006, underscores the dividend that Kim Jong Un has earned by moving closer to President Vladimir Putin amid the war in Ukraine.

"It is obvious to us that the UN Security Council can no longer use old templates in relation to the problems of the Korean Peninsula," said Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova.

Zakharova said the United States was stoking military tensions, that international restrictions had not improved the security situation and that there were severe humanitarian consequences for the population of North Korea, formally known as the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK).

"The United States and its allies have clearly demonstrated that their interest does not extend beyond the task of 'strangling' the DPRK by all available means, and a peaceful settlement is not on the agenda at all," she said.

The US State Department said on Thursday that Russia's veto had "cynically undermined international peace and security" and accused Moscow of seeking to bury reporting by the panel of experts on its own "collusion" with North Korea to get weapons.

"Russia alone will own the outcome of this veto: a DPRK more emboldened to reckless behavior and destabilizing provocations, as well as reduced prospects for an enduring peace on the Korean Peninsula," State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said.

"It's a remarkable shift," said Robert Einhorn, a State Department official during the Obama administration who is now a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution told The New York Times.

"For much of the post-Cold War period, the United States, Russia and China were partners in dealing with proliferation challenges, especially with North Korea and Iran. They were fully on the American and European side during the Iran negotiations, and helped with North Korea during the 'fire and fury' period in 2016 to 2017," he said, referring to the Obama administration's final negotiations with the North and former President Donald J Trump's threats when he came to office.

But as Einhorn noted, that unity has fractured with the re-emergence of great power competition. The partnership on containing nuclear threats, even from North Korea, whose nuclear facilities pose a safety challenge to both China and Russia, has vanished.

Russia is now helping North Korea evade sanctions, and neither Russia nor China is actively working to pressure Iran to slow its accumulation of enriched uranium, the critical step needed if it ever decides to build nuclear weapons.

When resolutions have come up to condemn North Korea for its constant barrage of missile tests, Russia and China have rejected them. But eliminating the "experts committee," which began its work in 2009, cuts new territory in relieving pressure on the country.

The Russian government made no apologies for killing off the panel.

The veto illustrates just how far the Ukraine war, which triggered the deepest crisis in Russia's relations with the West since the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, has undermined big-power cooperation on other major global issues.

Since Putin ordered the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Moscow has gone out of its way to parade a renaissance of its relationship - including military ties - with Pyongyang.

Washington says North Korea has supplied Russia with missiles that it is using against Ukraine, assertions which have been dismissed by the Kremlin and Pygonyang.

For Putin, who says Russia is locked in an existential battle with the West over Ukraine, courting Kim allows him to needle Washington and its Asian allies while securing a deep supply of artillery for the Ukraine war.

For Kim, who has pledged to accelerate production of nuclear weapons to deter what he casts as US provocations, Russia is a big power ally with deep stores of advanced missile, military, space and nuclear technology.