Following his meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Beijing, North Korean staff were seen meticulously cleaning everything the leader had touched. Analysts suggest this is part of a strict security protocol designed to prevent foreign espionage. Despite the appearance of a budding friendship between Kim and Putin, the footage showed the extraordinary measures taken by the reclusive state to conceal any clues about Kim’s health.
On Telegram, Kremlin reporter Alexander Yunashev shared a video of two of Kim’s staff members carefully cleaning the room in the Chinese capital where Kim and Putin had met for over two hours. The chair’s backrest and armrests were scrubbed, and a coffee table next to Kim’s chair was also cleaned. Kim’s drinking glass was also removed. “After the negotiations were over, the staff accompanying the head of the DPRK carefully destroyed all traces of Kim’s presence,” the reporter said, referring to North Korea.
After their talks, Kim and Putin left for a tea meeting and bid a warm farewell to each other. Such measures have been standard protocol since the era of Kim’s predecessor, his father Kim Jong Il, said Michael Madden, a North Korea leadership expert with the US-based Stimson Centre. “The special toilet and the requisite garbage bags of detritus, waste, and cigarette butts are so that a foreign intelligence agency, even a friendly one, does not acquire a sample and test it,” Madden explained.
He added, “It would provide insight into any medical conditions affecting Kim Jong Un. This can include hair and skin tags.” In 2019, after a Hanoi summit with then-US President Donald Trump, Kim’s guards were spotted blocking the floor of his hotel room to clean the room for hours and taking out items, including a bed mattress. Kim’s team has also been seen cleaning items before he uses them. During his 2018 meeting with then-South Korean President Moon Jae-in, North Korean security guards sprayed a chair and a desk with sanitizer and wiped them down before Kim sat down. At another summit with Putin in 2023, his security team wiped his chair down with disinfectant and vigorously checked to ensure it was safe, with one guard even using a metal detector to scan the seat, video footage showed.
