North Korea signed an official agreement with Russia to strengthen cooperation on media and public relations, further solidifying their information and media ties.
On the 13th, the Korean Central News Agency said that at the North Korean Embassy in Moscow, Sin Hong-chol, North Korea's ambassador to Russia, and Bella Mukharbiyevna Cherkesova, Russia's Vice Minister of Digital Development, Communications and Mass Media, signed an agreement on cooperation in the field of public information.
The Russian Embassy in North Korea said on its Telegram channel that the agreement "contains various practical measures to strengthen information exchange and media cooperation between the two countries."
The agreement includes information sharing between state-run and private outlets, the exchange of broadcasts, publications and promotional materials, and the establishment of a media network between the two countries.
The embassy called it "an important opportunity to advance bilateral cooperation in the media field to the next level."
North Korea's Public Information Committee is a kind of state publicity organ and media control body, and it had no notable public activity after Vice Chair Cho Young-sam visited Europe in 2018.
The agreement is seen as an effort to strengthen a cooperative framework for mutual promotion and image-building as the two countries rapidly draw closer.
In tandem, a delegation from Russia's state media group "Rossiya Segodnya" arrived in Pyongyang on the 10th and is scheduled to stay through the 14th to discuss ways to expand media exchanges.
Since concluding their Treaty on Comprehensive Strategic Partnership in June, North Korea and Russia have been expanding cooperation beyond politics, the military and the economy to information and communications and the media. Article 18 of the treaty states that they will "cooperate in the field of digital development and create conditions for mutual information exchange and cooperation."