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The White House says the reclusive leader of North Korea is planning to travel to Russia for his first talks with President Putin for four years.

US officials believe Kim Jong Un's visit is part of efforts by Moscow to boost supplies of shells and missiles for its troops in Ukraine. Any such deal would breach UN Security Council resolutions banning arms sales by North Korea.

Moscow and Pyongyang have not responded to the claims, which were first reported in the New York Times newspaper.

Jean H. Lee is an expert on North Korea and a senior fellow at the Wilson Center, a think-tank in Washington, DC. She told Newsday that North Korea is keen to improve their ballistic missile technology 鈥渁nd that might be why they鈥檙e reaching out to Russia鈥�to get a little bit of help and partnership on that element of their military development. However, in terms of what Russia is looking for鈥�North Korea did have a very robust conventional weapons system and military build-up throughout the tenure of the previous leader of North Korea, Kim Jong-il, I mean he had a million man army, one of the biggest armies in the world and certainly a lot of investment in conventional weaponry鈥�.

(Picture: Shows Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un at a reception in the far-eastern Russian port of Vladivostok on April 25, 2019. Credit: Alexey Nikolsky / Sputnik / AFP via Getty Images.)

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