I wonder if Vietnam is looking to stregthen ties with North Korea as some kind of hedge against China?:

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has pledged to deepen his country’s ties with Vietnam in a reply to President To Lam, Pyongyang’s state media said Tuesday.

Lam sent a letter to Kim on Sept. 9 to mark the 78th anniversary of North Korea’s national founding.

“The traditional relations of friendship and cooperation between the two countries, which entered a new development period after our Pyongyang meeting last October, will further expand and develop in the common interests of the two peoples,” Kim wrote in his reply sent Monday, according to the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).

Lam, in his last month’s letter, said relations had strengthened steadily since the summit and that both sides had carried out the leaders’ agreements. Vietnam, he added, was ready to work with North Korea for regional and global peace and stability.

Ties between the two countries have warmed since Lam’s October visit, the first by a top Vietnamese leader to the North in 18 years.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

It looks like the Lee administration are the only ones that dislike the the Ukrainian government as much as Trump:

North Korean soldiers take part in a battle against Ukraine in Russia’s front-line region of Kursk, in this file image taken from a documentary aired on Aug. 31, 2025, by North Korea’s official Korean Central Television. (For Use Only in the Republic of Korea. No Redistribution) (Yonhap)

Foreign Minister Cho Hyun said Tuesday that South Korea has withdrawn eight diplomatic personnel from Ukraine amid a dispute over Kyiv’s disclosure of the transfer of two North Korean prisoners of war (POWs).

Cho made the remarks during a parliamentary audit of the foreign ministry, saying that despite the partial withdrawal, he has continued communication with the Ukraine foreign minister to resolve the issue.

South Korea recalled its ambassador to Ukraine, Park Ki-chang, earlier this month and decided to withdraw some embassy personnel, citing Kyiv’s failure to take steps to resolve the dispute and persistent threats of Russian airstrikes.

“Eight have been withdrawn so far,” Cho said, adding that the withdrawal had been unavoidable given Ukraine’s failure to adequately address the issue.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

General Brunson continues to emphasize logistics and Korea becoming a repair and maintain hub for the U.S. military:

Commander Gen. Xavier Brunson on Monday called for improvements in military logistics and the incorporation of modern technology into military exercises, emphasizing the importance of sustainment capabilities in strengthening deterrence.

Brunson made the remarks in a post on X following a United Nations Command (UNC) logistics symposium attended by military logistics officials from participating nations.

“Sustainment is not support to the fight. It is what enables us to fight and win,” Brunson wrote. He concurrently serves as commander of the UNC and the South Korea-U.S. Combined Forces Command.

In the post, Brunson said he challenged participating logisticians to develop practical solutions and introduce modern technology into military exercises, stressing, “Endurance in theater is how we deter.”

The general has emphasized the importance of military logistics and sustainment capabilities, including efforts to establish South Korea as a regional hub for maintaining and repairing U.S. military assets.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link, but there is already a lot of sustainment capability that USFK has that units throughout the region use to repair Army equipment and vehicles. General Brunson appears to want to expand it even further to include a much wider range of equipment repair for the entire U.S. military.

It seems to me being effectively exihiled to Ghana is quite a bit of punishment already to go along with whatever jail sentence he gets in Korea:

A man in his 80s, suspected of transporting more than 5 tons of narcotics aboard a fishing vessel in waters off South America in the early 2000s, has been repatriated to South Korea after spending 22 years on the run, police said Monday.

The Korean National Police Agency (KNPA) said the man, whose identity was withheld, was brought back home on Oct. 20 in coordination with the Busan Coast Guard after being deported by authorities in Ghana, where he had been hiding for about 22 years.

The man is accused of transporting narcotics on behalf of a drug trafficking organization on five separate occasions in international waters off South America between 2002 and 2004, when he was serving as a supervisor of a deep-sea fishing vessel, and receiving payment for the shipments.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

This is what North Korea has always done, play off the Chinese and Russians to their advantage:

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un lays a flower basket at the Memorial Hall of the War to Resist U.S. Aggression and Aid Korea in Dandong, China, Saturday. Yonhap

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un’s trip to the Chinese border city of Dandong, made days before the anniversary of Chinese troops entering the 1950-53 Korean War, was aimed at reaffirming the historic blood ties between the two countries at a moment when Pyongyang’s alignment with Moscow has drawn Beijing’s attention, experts said. 

North’s state-run Rodong Sinmun on Sunday reported Kim’s visit to the Memorial Hall of the War to Resist U.S. Aggression and Aid Korea in Dandong the previous day. The state media repeatedly emphasized Kim’s paying tribute to fallen Chinese troops, remembering their shared history of fighting alongside North Korean forces and preserving ties forged in blood.

Kang Dong-wan, a professor of North Korean studies at Dong-A University, said the focus on China’s role in the war was deliberate, coming after a period in which the Beijing relationship had weakened relative to Pyongyang’s deepening partnership with Moscow, including the North’s troop deployment to Russia.

Korea Times

You can read more at the link.