North Korean leader Kim Jong-un visited neighboring China on Saturday in his first visit there in more than a year, meeting a top official and declaring his gratitude for Beijing’s decades of support, according to Chinese state media. Xinhua, China’s main state news agency, confirmed Kim’s one-day visit after a day of reports from South Korean officials and media that he had crossed a newly opened bridge that crosses the border between North Korea and northeastern China. Kim and Wang Huning, a senior Chinese Communist Party official, marked 76 years since Mao Zedong sent Chinese forces to North Korea to support its beleaguered communist troops during the Korean War against a United Nations coalition led by the United States, Xinhua reported. In the Chinese city of Dandong, a hub for travel and trade with North Korea, Kim said he had come to show his gratitude for Chinese troops who fought and died on the North’s side in the Korean War, according to Xinhua. He presented a wreath at a Chinese war memorial, Xinhua said. The ceremony also appeared to be an opportunity for the two governments to show their deepening ties despite heavy international sanctions against North Korea. Their partnership was highlighted by the opening this month of the new bridge over the Yalu River, where Kim crossed, according to South Korean officials and media outlets. Kim’s trip demonstrated the “friendship sealed in blood” between China and North Korea, said Wang, who for three decades served as a high-level ideological adviser to Chinese leaders, including Xi Jinping, the current top leader. The visit was “of great importance to carry forward the traditional friendship between China and North Korea” and “to deepen political mutual trust,” Wang said, according to Xinhua. But this time Kim did not meet Xi, the Chinese report stated. Mr. Wang conveyed Mr. Xi’s greetings to Mr. Kim, and Mr. Kim conveyed his best wishes to Mr. Xi, Xinhua said. “We are grateful for China’s long-standing support and assistance to the socialist cause of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea,” Mr. Kim said, using North Korea’s formal name. “The prospects for cooperation between our two sides are extremely broad.” Youn Kun-young, a member of the intelligence committee of South Korea’s National Assembly, told the New York Times that while the specific purpose of Kim’s trip required further analysis, “it is currently presumed to serve two objectives: to signal a positive outlook for a possible summit between North Korea and the United States and to address key developments in North Korea-China relations, including the opening of the new bridge over the Yalu River.” Kim also returned to North Korea via the new bridge, Xinhua said. Xi’s failure to meet Kim this time did not appear to be a snub. Starting Monday, Xi will chair a four-day meeting in Beijing of the Chinese Communist Party’s Central Committee, an assembly of about 300 senior officials. That would leave little or no time for other meetings in the days before. Xi visited Pyongyang, the capital of North Korea, in June, and Kim celebrated with a grand spectacle. Kim’s latest public appearance will help dispel recent social media rumors about his death, which South Korean intelligence officials had already dismissed as false. Signs of Kim’s trip had spread online before official confirmation. Posts on Chinese social media showed traffic jams in Dandong, and some users said residential complexes in the city had been closed to prevent people from leaving. The area around Wanda Plaza, a shopping center in Dandong, was blocked off and no one was allowed to enter, according to other posts. Diplomats and analysts have speculated that Kim could attend the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation leaders’ meeting next month in Shenzhen, southern China, although it is unclear whether China has invited him. President Trump, who has repeatedly expressed enthusiasm for resuming personal diplomacy with Kim, has said he will attend that meeting. Kim’s meetings with Trump in 2018 and 2019 were preceded or followed by meetings between Kim and Xi, conversations that appeared to show Pyongyang and Beijing were consulting each other on their approaches to Washington. Saturday’s visit may be a further sign that China and North Korea are improving ties, even as Kim also seeks to deepen ties with Russia. North Korea has provided Russia with artillery shells, missiles and troops critical to its war in Ukraine, prompting Moscow to sign a mutual defense treaty and supply the North with food, oil and advanced military technology. In response, Xi has taken steps to reassert Beijing’s influence. He invited both Mr. Kim and President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia to a military parade in Beijing in September 2025. Rail service between Beijing and Pyongyang, suspended during the Covid pandemic, resumed in March. Bilateral trade has expanded rapidly. Decades of international sanctions have made North Korea dependent on China for almost all of its foreign trade. Kim’s first visit to China and his first trip abroad as North Korea’s leader was in 2018. Since then, he has traveled to China several times and has held talks with Xi almost always. On his previous visit last year, he attended the military parade in Beijing, which marked the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II. Murphy Zhao contributed reporting from Hong Kong.
