Last week, Vladimir Putin visited his authoritarian comrade, Kim Jong Un, in North Korea. It has been a long, long time since he last made the trip — some 24 years.
This suggests that North Korea and Russia have not been aligned on global politics for most of the last two decades. However, contemporary events and converging interests have brought them closer together, much like the James Bond film title, "From Russia with Love."
Putin is losing international prestige amid his botched invasion of Ukraine, an attempt to incorporate a sovereign neighbor into his vision of a modern-day Russian Empire. What was expected to be a lightning strike lasting just under a week has turned into a prolonged quagmire, with Russia losing tens of thousands of men and vast amounts of military resources and hardware.