WASHINGTON, November 23. /TASS/. The US administration believes that the cooperation between Russia and North Korea will be a formidable challenge for Washington for years to come, Mira Rapp-Hooper, Special Assistant to US President, National Security Council Senior Director for East Asia and Oceania, said.

The current administration is concerned about "how far it [the relationship between North Korea and Russia - TASS] has come so quickly," she said. Speaking at a seminar at Washington’s Center for Strategic and International Studies (this organization’s activities are recognized as undesirable on the territory of the Russian Federation), Rapp-Hooper said that this cooperation has reached a scale that "could not have been imagined a few years ago."

She also mentioned the US administration’s version, according to which North Korea has allegedly sent troops to engage in active combat in Ukraine, saying that in response "the Russians <…> probably give the North Koreans high end technical assistance on an order, as well as protect them in international institutions and seek to legitimize their nuclear weapons capability." "And that is going to be a formidable challenge for administrations, I suspect, for years to come," Rapp-Hooper noted.

In turn, First Deputy US Secretary of State Kurt Campbell said that the cooperation between Russia and North Korea "is not only going to be urgent, but it's going to be a growing issue that cannot be ignored."

Commenting on earlier "satellite images" released by Seoul that allegedly show the presence of North Korean servicemen in Russia, President Vladimir Putin called such photos a "serious matter." However, he emphasized that NATO servicemen have long been directly involved in the Ukrainian conflict. Putin pointed out that the strategic partnership treaty between Moscow and Pyongyang includes a clause on joint defense.

For her part, Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova has said that the strategic cooperation between Moscow and Pyongyang is not unusual or extraordinary, despite the West's attempts to demonize it. She emphasized that those who are committed to peaceful cooperation with Moscow have nothing to fear.