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Uganda, one of Pyongyang’s few allies, announced that it will put an end to its cooperation with North Korea. The announcement came following a meeting between South Korean President Park Geun-hye and Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni.
After his meeting with Park on Sunday, Musevini announced that he’d decided that Uganda would cease its military cooperation with North Korea to comply with increasingly harsh United Nations sanctions against the country for its nuclear weapons program.
For Uganda abandoning North Korea means being able to deepen its ties with South Korea. The Wall Street Journal reports, for example, that Seoul and Kampala are looking to increase economic and defense cooperation. Reportedly, the two countries signed 10 agreements “in areas including military, rural development, health, agriculture and information and communications technologyâ€.
A defense agreement will see South Korea and Uganda “expand cooperation in the area of military technology and training†to help “fill the void created by the disengagement of defense and police cooperation with North Korea,†according to a Ugandan foreign ministry spokesperson quoted by the Journal. For Uganda, the decision to leave North Korea behind is made more
attractive by a comprehensive deepening of its ties with South Korea.
Uganda’s decision to end ties with North Korea wasn’t one taken lightly. The two countries have had a remarkably close relationship, spanning decades. Idi Amin, Uganda’s infamous dictator, established military ties in the 1970s that saw Pyongyang provide assistance for Uganda’s armed forces. Even as Uganda has moved away from the brutality of the Cold War years, North Korean security assistance has continued. For instance, “North Korean instructors have been training Ugandan police in areas including forensic investigations, public-order management, and handling of weapons such as
pistols and AK-47s,†the Journal notes.
Kim Yong-nam, the chairman on the presidium of the Supreme Peoples’ Assembly of North Korea, has regularly visited Uganda. Last year, the two countries strengthened their bilateral ties during a visit by Kim in January. In October 2014, Kim received a “hero’s welcome†in Kampala, one analyst noted.
Given the deep history between North Korea and Uganda, Musevini’s decision to substitute Seoul for Pyongyang in the country’s diplomacy speaks to both the effectiveness of the latest sanctions against
North Korea and South Korea’s diplomatic outreach to Pyongyang’s few
remaining allies.
Ankit Panda is an editor at The Diplomat