A senior Chinese official will visit North Korea, leading an art troupe as Pyongyang and Beijing have agreed to strengthen cultural exchanges, the North's state media said Wednesday.
The visit comes in a thawing sign of the two countries' strained ties after North Korean leader Kim Jong-un made a surprise visit to Beijing last month for a summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping.
The art group, led by Song Tao, the head of the international department at the Central Committee of the Communist Party, will attend the 31st April Spring Friendship Art Festival, the Korean Central News Agency said.
(Yonhap)
The report said that a large-scale art group will make the first visit to the North after Kim and Xi recently agreed to strengthen cultural exchanges.
It did not elaborate on its itinerary, but China's Xinhua News Agency said that the group will leave for the North on Friday at the invitation of the ruling Worker's Party of Korea.
The trip will "consolidate the cornerstone of the DPRK-China cultural exchange and strengthening the traditional DPRK-China friendly relations onto a new high stage," the KCNA said, referring to the acronym of North Korea's official name, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.
The North has held the festival every two years since 1982 to mark the birthday of late founder Kim Il-sung on April 15, known as the Day of the Sun. This year's event will be held from Wednesday to next Tuesday.
"The move appears intended to strengthen cultural exchanges following the North-China summit," Baik Tae-hyun, spokesman at Seoul's unification ministry, told a press briefing.
"We will closely watch whether a concert in China by a North Korean art troupe could be pushed for again after its thwarted performance in December 2015."
North Korea's all-female Moranbong Band abruptly canceled a planned performance in Beijing in 2015 and returned home amid reports that China complained about the North's plan to show footage of Pyongyang's development of a hydrogen bomb on stage.
Kim's trip to China marked a turnaround in the long-frayed ties between Pyongyang and Beijing over the North's nuclear and missile tests. It was his first overseas trip since he took office in late 2011.
China, the North's only ally and main economic benefactor, has been implementing tough international sanctions against North Korea.
Kim's visit was seen as intended to secure more bargaining chips ahead of his planned meetings with President Moon Jae-in and US President Donald Trump. For China, the Xi-Kim summit apparently helped highlight Beijing's leverage over the North in resolving the North's nuclear standoff.
Song visited Pyongyang in November last year as a special envoy of Xi, but he could not meet with Kim Jong-un.
But during Kim's visit to China, Song warmly welcomed him in what appears to be a special train that carried Kim and his entourage to China.
"The art troupe's visit is part of efforts to implement agreements reached at the Kim-Xi summit. It seems that the North-China relations are fast normalizing," said Yang Moo-jin, a professor at the University of North Korean Studies.(Yonhap)
