MOSCOW, April 23. /TASS/. Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un can raise the issue of easing international sanctions against North Korea during the upcoming negotiations, Roman Lobov, a Valdai Club expert and a Research Fellow at the Center for Asia and Pacific Region at the Russian Institute for Strategic Studies, told TASS on Tuesday.

"The agenda of the upcoming meeting may include both issues related to the current situation on the Korean Peninsula and the prospects for Russian-Korean relations," he said.

According to the expert, the two leaders "can also raise the issue of international sanctions" against North Korea. "Unfortunately, the current tough sanctions leave little room for maneuver in the Russian-North Korean cooperation. In light of that, our country is interested in easing tensions in the region and revising the sanctions imposed by the UN Security Council," Lobov went on to say.

The expert explained that Moscow would stand to gain from easing sanctions against North Korea, since they hinder the full-fledged implementation of regional projects involving Russia. "Russian businesses could be interested in cultivating economic ties with North Korea, which, despite the sanctions, is having an economic boom," he stressed.

Lobov added that Russian diplomats could contribute to efforts aimed at resuming the work of the six-party mechanism (North Korea, South Korea, China, Russia, the United States and Japan) to discuss the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, which ended its work in 2008 at Pyongyang’s initiative.

According to Kremlin Aide Yuri Ushakov, Putin and Kim Jong-un will hold talks in Vladivostok on April 25.