South Korea to hold meeting of diplomatic missions next week
South Korea will open an annual meeting of its top envoys abroad next week with a focus on strengthening its diplomacy amid geopolitical challenges, the foreign ministry said on Thursday.
Chinese President Xi Jinping on Saturday responded to North Korean leader Kim Jong-un’s congratulatory message for successfully containing the novel coronavirus in the Asian giant, where the disease originated last December.
Xi “sent a verbal message of thanks to Kim Jong-un” in response to Kim’s earlier note, according to the media report.
In a “verbal message”, Kim had said that Xi was “seizing a chance of victory in the war against the unprecedented epidemic and strategically and tactically controlling the overall situation while leading the Chinese party and people”, Efe news quoted North Korean state-run KCNA as saying in a report on Friday.
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China’s National Health Commission reported only a single new case Saturday, and no new deaths, bringing the total cases to 82,887, while deaths sat at 4,633, and total recoveries at 78,046 since the outbreak began in Wuhan, Hubei province.
Kim had also wished Xi “good health” and expressed conviction that “the Chinese party and people would cement the successes made so far and steadily expand them and thus win a final victory under the wise guidance of Xi Jinping”, KCNA added.
On Friday, Kim sent a letter to Russian President Vladimir Putin to congratulate him on the 75th anniversary of the allied victory in World War II and wishing Russia success in fighting its coronavirus outbreak.
Last week, Kim made his first public appearance since speculation about his health began last month, cutting the ribbon at the opening of a fertilizer factory.
Earlier, the North Korean leader was gravely ill following heart surgery.
On Wednesday, according to the Yonhap news agency, there are no signs that Kim received heart surgery when he disappeared from state media for three weeks, but he reduced public activity due to coronavirus concerns.
South Korea’s Unification Minister Kim Yeon-Chul, who oversees North Korea affairs, has said Kim’s public disappearance was not particularly unusual because the country had been taking stringent steps to head off an outbreak.
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