Kim Jong Un showed today that he does not fully trust fellow tyrant Vladimir Putin as some of his lackeys conducted rigorous checks on his seat ahead of their highly anticipated summit in Russia today.
Footage first showed a man wearing white gloves and a dark suit wiping down the black chair with a white cloth before the two leaders sat down for the meeting, which lasted more than four hours at Russia’s spaceport in the Far East.
The nervous man thoroughly cleaned the seat itself, the back of the chair and the armrests, with the support of two other North Korean officials who stood behind him with more cleaning products if necessary.
But the control was not over yet. After making sure the chair was clean, a second official – a man dressed identically to the first – tested whether the chair was strong enough to support the weight of its supreme leader, who reportedly weighs about 300 pounds.
The first man then appeared to scan the chair with a device that resembled a small metal detector, apparently for booby traps.
Kim Jong Un showed today that he does not fully trust fellow tyrant Vladimir Putin when some of his lackeys rigorously checked his seat ahead of their highly anticipated summit in Russia today (pictured)
Footage first showed a man wearing white gloves and a dark suit wiping the black chair with a white cloth before the two leaders sat down for the meeting, before another man tested the chair’s strength. The first man also appeared to pass a device over the seat of the chair that appeared to be a portable metal detector
It appears Kim (left) left nothing to chance during his meeting with Putin (right), despite the pair professing their mutual friendship during the meeting at the Vostochny cosmodrome
A third North Korean official was also present to assist during the checks, appearing to guide the men as they tested the weight.
A fourth person, who looked like a Russian, watched intently, peering over the shoulder of one of the North Korean officials.
One of the North Korean security officers also appears reluctant to let a Putin guard be the last man near the chair before Kim sat in it.
It is unclear who recorded the images, why the men were instructed to clean the chair so thoroughly and what they checked for with the device.
But Putin’s assassination squads are also known to use the deadly agents Novichok and Polonium 210 to poison enemies or discarded friends.
With that in mind, it seems Kim left nothing to chance, despite the pair professing their mutual friendship during the meeting at the Vostochny cosmodrome.
It is more obvious why Kim’s officials checked the chair’s robustness. The North Korean dictator reportedly weighs more than 300 pounds (136 kg).
The images show that the chair is a design popularized by IKEA, which has no back legs and is instead supported by a single curved frame.
If the chair were to collapse under his weight, it would be a huge embarrassment for Kim, who is eager to demonstrate his strength as a leader.
The North Korean dictator reportedly weighs more than 280 pounds (130 kg)
At the meeting, Kim vowed “full and unconditional support” for Putin as the two Western-isolated leaders held the summit that the US warns could lead to a deal to provide ammunition for Moscow’s war in Ukraine.
The Korean dictator took other precautions during his latest visit to Russia.
Kim refused to use a plane to travel the 948 miles from Vladivostok to the spaceport in the Amur region during his first foreign visit since 2019.
Instead, he insisted on using his luxurious, heavily armored train on which he had traveled from Pyongyang. The train is known to come with extensive security details.
Russian airspace is notoriously unsafe, with a tourist plane making an emergency landing this week.
Putin’s former warlord Yevgeny Prigozhin, head of Wagner’s mercenary army, was killed when his plane exploded in the sky near Moscow last month, amid claims he was killed on the orders of the Kremlin dictator.
Kim – who also has a track record of killing his enemies and friends – often insists on using the train like his father Kim Jong Il on state visits.
At the meeting, Kim vowed “full and unconditional support” for Putin as the two Western-isolated leaders held the summit that the US warns could lead to an agreement on the supply of ammunition for Moscow’s war in Ukraine.
Putin is believed to be looking for one of the few things impoverished North Korea has in abundance: stockpiles of outdated ammunition and missiles for Soviet-era weapons.
The meeting underlines how their interests align: Putin is believed to be seeking one of the few things impoverished North Korea has in abundance: stockpiles of outdated ammunition and missiles for Soviet-era weapons.
Such a request would mark a reversal of roles from the 1950-53 Korean War, when Moscow supplied weapons in support of Pyongyang’s invasion of South Korea, and in the decades of Soviet sponsorship of the North that followed.
The decision to meet at the Vostochny Cosmodrome, Russia’s main launch center on its own soil, suggests Kim is seeking Russian help in developing military reconnaissance satellites, which he has described as crucial to increasing the threat from his nuclear missiles.
In recent months, North Korea has repeatedly failed to put its first military spy satellite into orbit.