Kim Jong Un crosses into China over the new Yalu River bridge, visits Dandong with Wang Huning: first trip to China in over a year

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un spent Saturday, October 24 in China, crossing the Yalu River (Amnok for Koreans) over the new road bridge that opened on October 15. His destination was the border city of Dandong, in Liaoning province, opposite North Korea’s Sinuiju. It was his first visit to China since September 2025 and his sixth overall, and he returned home the same day.

In Dandong he was received by Wang Huning, member of the Standing Committee of the Chinese Communist Party’s Politburo and chairman of the National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, who conveyed greetings and wishes from Xi Jinping. Foreign Minister Wang Yi also took part, as state agency Xinhua recorded.

The symbolism of the day was strong: the visit took place on the eve of the 76th anniversary of the entry of the Chinese People’s Volunteers into the Korean War, which Pyongyang and Beijing commemorate on October 25. In China the 1950-1953 war is called the “War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea”, and the Dandong museum bears the same name. There Kim laid a basket of flowers in the morning at the memorial tower in the square while the two countries’ national anthems played. He arranged the ribbon himself, which read in Korean “The martyrs of the Chinese People’s Volunteers will be remembered forever”, and all observed a moment of silence for the dead. He then toured the museum, to which he donated a historic photograph with his handwritten dedication.

The meeting

In the meeting Wang stressed the future of relations. He said the new bridge should be used for more people-to-people exchanges and trade cooperation, and asked for closer “strategic communication” to ensure a peaceful and stable external environment for the sovereignty, security and development of both states. Of the visit itself he said it shows how much Pyongyang values the friendship of the two countries, “forged in blood”, and recalled that the mutual visits of Xi and Kim in September 2025 and June 2026 put relations into a “new historic period”.

Kim said he came to honour the memory of the fallen Chinese People’s Volunteers, who “with their lives and blood” supported Korea at a critical historic moment. He called Xi’s visit to Pyongyang in June a milestone, recalled that this year marks 65 years of the Treaty of Friendship, Cooperation and Mutual Assistance, and thanked Beijing for its long-standing support for his country’s “socialist cause”. He wished success to the 5th Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Chinese party. In the afternoon the two men visited a car factory in Dandong, and Wang saw off Kim on the bridge.

The bridge and APEC

South Korea’s Yonhap agency confirmed the crossing, citing government sources. The four-lane, 3,026-metre bridge was completed in 2014 with about $310 million in Chinese funding, but remained closed for years because North Korea had not built the connecting roads and customs facilities on its side. Next month China hosts the APEC summit in Shenzhen, where Donald Trump is expected and has said he wants to meet Kim. Pyongyang has not replied. A day earlier, Kim had asked his army’s company commanders to accelerate a “military revolution”.