MOSCOW, January 11./TASS/. Russian President Vladimir Putin has called North Korean leader Kim Jong Un "an absolutely competent and already mature politician" who has solved the strategic task through creating a nuclear device and long-range missiles. The president believes it is necessary to conduct negotiations in the issue of denuclearization of the Korean peninsula.

The North Korean leader "has solved his strategic task - he has a nuclear device, and a global-range missile with a range of up to 13,000 kilometers, which can now reach practically any point of the globe, at any rate any point on the territory of a potential enemy," Putin said at a meeting with the leadership of the Russian printed media and news agency.

Now, the North Korean leader is of course interested in cooling the situation down, he went on. "He is an absolutely competent and already mature politician," Putin said, adding that the difficult task of denuclearization of the Korean peninsula should be solved only through a dialogue, through negotiations.

"I think that this is possible in the long run no matter how difficult it may seem," he went on, focusing on the settlement of the Korean peninsula’s nuclear problem. The president said this may happen if all participants in this process, including North Koreans, will be sure that their security can be guaranteed without nuclear weapons.