DECODING: Two years of the Moscow-Pyongyang treaty: the axis of authoritarians

DECODING: Two years of the Moscow-Pyongyang treaty: the axis of authoritarians

Introduction: a treaty that changed the global security landscape

June 22, 2024: a date to remember

On June 22, 2024, Vladimir Putin landed in Pyongyang and set his signature alongside Kim Jong-un's on a mutual defense treaty. Two years later, on June 22, 2026, North Korea celebrates this anniversary by pledging "even deeper ties" with Moscow. These two years have been short in calendar terms and long in consequences. They have transformed what resembled a ceremonial diplomatic agreement into an operational military alliance, with thousands of North Korean soldiers deployed in Ukraine, documented military technology transfers, and strategic coordination that surpasses everything analysts had anticipated.

This decoding examines what two years of treaty have concretely produced, what both parties obtained, and what this means for global security. The answer is more troubling than reassuring. The Moscow-Pyongyang treaty is not a partnership between two states under pressure huddling together — it is a structural alliance of the global authoritarian axis that changes strategic balances well beyond the Korean peninsula alone.

A treaty that defied analysts' expectations

When the treaty was signed in June 2024, most analysts commented on it cautiously. Some noted the apparent haste — Putin making the trip to Pyongyang for the first time in 24 years. Others underlined that the texts of treaties between authoritarian regimes are often more symbolic than operational. The history of the past two years has proven these cautious readings wrong. This treaty became operational at a speed and depth that few had anticipated. The 10,000 to 15,000 North Korean soldiers deployed in Russia since autumn 2024 are the most visible and documented proof of this.

According to Ground News of June 22, 2026, Pyongyang did not simply celebrate this anniversary with speeches — it reaffirmed its commitment to "deeper ties" with Moscow, signaling that the treaty is set to expand and deepen, not stagnate or formalize into diplomatic routine.

What Russia obtained from the treaty

Soldiers, munitions, legitimacy

On the Russian side, the two-year treaty balance sheet is concrete and documented. In terms of human resources, Russia received between 10,000 and 15,000 North Korean soldiers — a force that partially compensated for the considerable losses of the Russian army in Ukraine and allowed the maintenance of troop numbers across multiple fronts. These soldiers are not a substitute army: they are support forces that have taken charge of certain positions while freeing Russian units for other missions.

In terms of munitions, North Korea supplied millions of 152mm artillery shells and other calibers compatible with Soviet-inherited systems in the Russian army. This supply proved significant at moments when Russian ammunition supply lines were showing signs of strain. Western sanctions on ammunition exports to Russia made these North Korean alternatives strategically valuable.

An inverted international legitimacy

Less visible but equally real: the treaty offered Putin a form of inverted international legitimacy. Faced with Russia's growing isolation in Western forums, Moscow's capacity to build and maintain alliances with other states — even pariah states — demonstrates that Russia is not alone. It is not democratic recognition that Putin seeks. It is proof that an alternative bloc exists, functional, capable of action. The alliance with Pyongyang, with Tehran (which supplies drones), with Beijing (which maintains its commercial exports) — all these relationships form a network that Moscow can present as its own alliance system.

For Russian domestic propaganda, this network is essential. It allows Putin to present the war in Ukraine not as the isolated adventure of a pariah state, but as the resistance of a great country against Western hegemony, supported by other "great countries" who also refuse to bow. North Korea plays this rhetorical role with enthusiasm.

What North Korea obtained

Military technologies and combat experience

The North Korean two-year treaty balance sheet is, in many respects, even more substantial than the Russian one. North Korea obtained what it had been seeking for years and what sanctions had prevented it from acquiring. First, space and missile technologies — Russian assistance has allowed the North Korean spy satellite programs to advance spectacularly. Pyongyang launched at least one military reconnaissance satellite into functional orbit, giving it an independent observation capability that democracies can no longer ignore.

The combat experience accumulated by North Korean soldiers deployed in Ukraine is the second major gain. As mentioned in the companion article, officers who have observed how drones work, how modern counter-battery functions, how anti-drone defense operates, how precision guidance systems perform — all of this represents a technological and doctrinal upgrade for the KPA that is worth far more than any equipment purchase.

Fuel, food and critical resources

On the economic side, North Korea received in exchange for its soldiers and munitions energy resources — Russian fuel and coal — that partially eased the constraints imposed by sanctions. These resources do not replace a normal economy, but they allow the regime to maintain its military priorities without completely sacrificing the basic needs of its population — which would be potentially destabilizing.

The treaty also opened channels for parallel economic exchanges — Russian grain toward North Korea, North Korean minerals toward Russia — that circumvent official sanctions circuits. These exchanges occur via networks of intermediaries in Southeast Asia and the Middle East, using ships that change flags and transactions in cryptocurrencies or local currencies rather than dollars or euros.

The authoritarian axis: beyond the bilateral treaty

The geometry of the anti-Western alliance

The Moscow-Pyongyang treaty does not exist in a vacuum. It is part of a broader network of relationships among authoritarian regimes that mutually reinforce each other. China maintains its economic support for Russia while diplomatically protecting North Korea. Iran has supplied drones that killed Ukrainians while negotiating with the United States. Pyongyang supplies munitions and soldiers. This coordination is not formalized in a multilateral treaty — that would be too visible and too easily targeted by sanctions. It operates bilaterally but complementarily, each pair of partners responding to specific mutual needs.

This network forms an architecture of mutual support that allows each member to withstand Western pressure longer than it could alone. Russia without North Korean munitions and Iranian drones would be in a more difficult military situation. North Korea without Russian support and Chinese diplomatic cover would be economically even more strangled. Iran without Russian and North Korean buyers for its drones would lose a market that financed its development program. This interdependence is the strength of the authoritarian axis.

What the West does not yet understand sufficiently

One of the great analytical errors of the West since 2022 has been to treat the various authoritarian threats as separate challenges, to be managed by distinct teams and policies. The Russian file in one department, the Chinese file in another, North Korea in one office, Iran in another. Meanwhile, these regimes — they coordinate. Not perfectly, not without internal tensions, but they coordinate nonetheless.

Western foreign policy needs an integrated approach that recognizes these threats reinforce each other and must be addressed together. Weakening Russia in Ukraine means reducing the resources available to finance the North Korean ballistic program. Effectively sanctioning Iranian arms exports means reducing drones striking Ukrainian cities. Limiting Chinese technology transfers to North Korea means slowing the spy satellite program that improves KPA targeting capabilities. Everything is connected.

Two years of sanctions and their limits

What sanctions have — and have not — accomplished

The international sanctions against North Korea — voted by the UN Security Council during previous nuclear crises — have been largely circumvented since Russia blocked their strengthening through its veto power. China, which partially enforced these sanctions in the past, now enforces them even less rigorously since Sino-Russian relations have deepened Pyongyang's diplomatic protection.

This erosion of the sanctions regime has real consequences: North Korea continues to export coal and labor through intermediary countries, continues to receive fuel, continues to find markets for its products. Sanctions create frictions and additional costs, but they do not strangle the regime the way they did at their peak between 2017 and 2019.

Autonomous sanctions as an alternative

Faced with the UN blockage, the United States, the EU, Japan and South Korea can intensify autonomous sanctions — national or bilateral measures that do not require Security Council agreement. These sanctions can target the entities that facilitate Russian-North Korean transfers: banks in Southeast Asia, shell companies in Hong Kong, petroleum intermediaries. They are less comprehensive than a UN regime, but they can be faster to implement and less susceptible to veto.

The American expansion of sanctions lists against facilitating entities — an approach the administration used to target Iranian arms exports to Russia — can be applied with the same logic to the Russian-North Korean support network. The key is a precise mapping of networks — financial, logistical, technological — and a no-exception enforcement of sanctions once these networks have been identified.

The economic dimension of the Moscow-Pyongyang alliance

A cooperation that circumvents sanctions

Russian-North Korean economic cooperation is not limited to the most visible military exchanges. It comprises a network of economic transactions that circumvent international sanctions. North Korean ships transport coal toward Russia in exchange for petroleum products. North Korean workers — officially "students" or "interns" — work in Russian industries in exchange for foreign currency that feeds Pyongyang's state budget. These flows, documented by sanctions experts, represent significant resources for both regimes.

The mutual defense treaty of June 2024 formalized and deepened these exchanges. Russia protects North Korea diplomatically at the UN Security Council, preventing any strengthening of sanctions. In exchange, Pyongyang provides munitions, soldiers and political support. This is a symbiotic relationship that the second anniversary celebrated on June 22, 2026 confirms as durable.

Cryptocurrencies and the financing of the nuclear program

North Korea finances a significant portion of its nuclear and ballistic program through massive cyber-theft operations. State-linked hacker groups — notably the Lazarus Group — have stolen billions of dollars in cryptocurrencies from exchanges and decentralized finance projects. These funds, quietly converted into national currencies through intermediaries in Southeast Asia, directly contribute to financing programs that sanctions are precisely designed to cut off from funding.

This funding mechanism through cybercrime illustrates the North Korean regime's capacity for adaptation. Every time sanctions closed a traditional funding channel, Pyongyang opened a new one. This adaptation pattern is crucial to understand: sanctions are not useless, but they must be accompanied by an equally constant effort to close the alternative channels the regime inevitably develops.

Regional perspectives: Japan, South Korea facing the axis

Tokyo facing the coordinated threat

Japan is the democracy most directly exposed to the consequences of the Russian-North Korean axis. Pyongyang's medium-range ballistic missiles cover the entire Japanese archipelago. Regular tests — missiles overflying Japanese territory or falling into the sea off its coasts — maintain permanent psychological and strategic pressure on Tokyo. And the strengthening of KPA capabilities through documented Russian technology transfers since 2024 worsens this picture.

The Japanese response takes two complementary forms. Defensively, the strengthening of Aegis systems and missile defense capabilities. Offensively — a historic doctrinal novelty — the development of a counter-strike capability against enemy launch sites. This doctrinal shift, which implied a revision of the constitutional principles born of post-war pacifism, illustrates how the North Korean threat reinforced by Russia transforms the strategic postures even of the most prudent democracies.

South Korean resilience as a model

South Korea offers a model of resilience in the face of the North Korean threat that deserves to be studied. A cutting-edge economy, world-class military technology, a solid alliance with the United States, and the capacity to maintain a partial diplomatic opening toward the North while maintaining a firm defensive posture — this is a difficult balance that Seoul has maintained for decades, under the permanent threat of artillery 50 kilometers away.

Seoul's decision to welcome North Korean prisoners held in Ukraine — documented by Caliber.az on June 23, 2026 — fits into this logic of pressure through all available levers. South Korea uses military, diplomatic, economic and now informational tools to maintain pressure on a regime that has not fundamentally changed in seventy years. This multi-domain approach is the model that other democracies facing persistent authoritarian threats should study.

Lessons for the West: how to respond to the authoritarian axis

An integrated approach against a coordinated adversary

The Moscow-Beijing-Pyongyang-Tehran axis is not formalized in a multilateral treaty but it functions in a coordinated fashion on the essentials. Moscow receives soldiers and munitions from Pyongyang, drones from Tehran, economic support from Beijing. Pyongyang receives technologies and diplomatic protection from Moscow, commercial cover from Beijing. Tehran sells its drones, benefits from Russian and Chinese support at the Security Council. This mutual support network strengthens each actor individually and the whole collectively.

The Western response must be equivalently integrated. Weakening Russia in Ukraine reduces the resources available to support Pyongyang. Sanctioning Iranian arms exports reduces strikes on Ukrainian civilians and signals to Tehran that there is a price for its complicity. Limiting Chinese technology transfers to Pyongyang slows the North Korean ballistic program. Everything is connected, and a strategy that treats these threats separately leaves blind spots that adversaries exploit.

Investing in the resilience of allied democracies

Faced with the authoritarian axis, the most durable investment is in the resilience of allied democracies — South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, the Baltic states, Ukraine. These countries are on the front line. Their capacity to resist, to prosper despite pressure, to maintain their democratic values in hostile environments — this is the best demonstration that the democratic model can face authoritarian threats without itself becoming what it combats.

Concrete solidarity with these allies takes multiple forms: explicit security guarantees, armaments, intelligence sharing, economic support, diplomatic presence. The second anniversary of the Moscow-Pyongyang treaty should remind Western governments that their own alliances — NATO, the Indo-Pacific partnerships — are their principal strategic asset against this axis. An asset that demands constant upkeep and regular investment to remain credible and deterrent.

Conclusion: the authoritarian axis must be taken seriously

Two years that cannot be ignored

The second anniversary of the Moscow-Pyongyang treaty on June 22, 2026 deserves to be treated not as a routine diplomatic event but as a serious strategic milestone. Two years of this treaty have produced: North Korean soldiers fighting in Europe, military technologies improving KPA capabilities, a network of economic cooperation circumventing sanctions, and an announcement by Kim of a "destructive posture" that fits into this context of renewed strength.

Democracies must respond to this axis with a coherence they have not yet fully demonstrated. This means treating North Korean, Russian, Iranian and Chinese threats as an integrated system, not as separate files. It means more aggressive sanctions on mutual support networks. And it means solidarity with South Korea and Japan that is commensurate with the real level of threat — not the one from five years ago, but the one of today.

The choice the West must make

The anniversary of the Moscow-Pyongyang treaty poses a fundamental question to the West: is it ready to treat the authoritarian axis as the coordinated system it is, or will it continue to manage each threat separately, leaving authoritarian regimes to exploit the blind spots of this fragmentation? The answer to this question will determine, more than any other factor, the evolution of global security in the coming years. The past two years have shown what this axis can accomplish when it acts in concert. The next two years will show whether the West can respond with equivalent coherence.

By Maxime Marquette, columnist

Columnist's transparency note

My perspective on the authoritarian axis

I am a columnist who firmly believes that authoritarian regimes — Russia, China, North Korea, Iran — collectively constitute the greatest threat to the liberal international order and to democracies. This reading framework profoundly influences the way I analyze the Moscow-Pyongyang treaty and its implications. I do not claim neutrality on this question: I believe democracies must act, not merely observe.

I work exclusively from open sources. The figures for deployed soldiers, economic estimates and details of technology transfers I cite come from reference journalistic and institutional sources, and may be incomplete or partially inaccurate — precise information on Russian-North Korean cooperation remains largely classified.

What this article does not cover

This decoding does not address in detail the Chinese positions regarding the Russia-North Korea treaty — a crucial subject that would deserve a full article. It also does not cover the internal North Korean dynamics around the deployment — the way the population and the regime's elites perceive this alliance. These dimensions are important for a complete understanding but go beyond the scope of this decoding.

Sources

Primary sources

Ground News — North Korea pledges deeper ties with Russia on the 2nd anniversary of the treaty — June 22, 2026

ABC News — Kim Jong-un calls for a destructive military posture — June 25, 2026

TASS — Russian concerns over American-South Korean military activities — June 25, 2026

Caliber.az — Seoul opens the door to North Korean prisoners in Ukraine — June 23, 2026

Secondary sources

Euromaidan Press — The EU maintains its full anti-Russia economic sanctions wall through 2027 — June 26, 2026

Kyiv Post — The Baltic states press the EU to accelerate the Russian oil embargo — June 27, 2026