Putin is desperate for North Korea's stockpile of weapons, but they're outdated and unreliable, say experts

• Russia's Vladimir Putin will host North Korea's Kim Jong Un in Vladivostok, reports say.
• The leaders will likely discuss potential arms deals, analysts say.

Russian President Vladimir Putin appears to be desperate for North Korea's stockpile of weapons, but they're outdated and unreliable, according to experts

It follows reports that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un is preparing to make a rare foreign trip to visit President Vladimir Putin in Russia.

The planned meeting is raising concerns over a new weapons deal between the authoritarian leaders.

Putin is seeking to bolster his forces as they battle Ukraine's counteroffensive, and Kim is seeking supplies and diplomatic support amid North Korea's international isolation.

But analysts believe that North Korea's weapons stockpiles are aging and ineffective, and won't provide Putin with the solutions he needs in Ukraine, where his troops are facing equipment and ammunition shortages.

John Everard, who served as UK ambassador to North Korea between 2006 and 2008, told the BBC that while North Korea has stockpiles of weapons that Moscow needs, "they're in very poor condition."

Ben Wallace, the former UK defense secretary, meanwhile accused Putin of "begging" for outdated North Korean weapons in his desperation to secure new weapons supplies.

The meeting comes amid Ukraine's counteroffensive to drive Russian forces back from territory they occupy in south and east Ukraine. Both sides in the conflict are quickly running through their stockpiles of equipment and ammunition, and struggling to resupply their front line troops quickly enough.

Putin is casting his net widely in his search for weapons and military equipment, calling on allies in other states hostile to US global influence, including Iran and North Korea, which are struggling under international sanctions.

Last year, US official claimed that North Korea had begun selling Russia rockets and artillery shells in contravention of a 2016 UN Security Council resolution backed at the time by Russia. Such Soviet-era equipment would be readily compatible with Russia's weapons.

But analysts believe that North Korea's weapons are in a shoddy state, and are unlikely to make a decisive impact in Ukraine.

They point to an attack by North Korea on the South Korean island of Yeonpyeong Island in 2010, when around half of the 170 shells fired by North Korea using a multiple rocket launcher, or MRL, failed to hit their target.

"This high failure rate suggests that some [North Korean]-manufactured artillery munitions – especially MRL rounds – suffer from either poor quality control during manufacturing or that storage conditions and standards are poor," a report at the time by 38 North, a US-based site that monitors North Korea, said.

Last year, Ukraine claimed to have seized a batch of North Korean rockets from Russia and fired them back at their enemy, with one Ukrainian troop commenting on the poor quality of the weapons.

"They are very unreliable and do crazy things sometimes," he told The Financial Times.

While North Korea could also potentially supply Russia with its more sophisticated, long-range missiles, these would be more difficult to export than its ammunition, as it might require specialist equipment to fire them, Go Myong-Hyun, a senior research fellow at the Asan Institute of Policy Studies in Seoul, told The Wall St. Journal last year.

"Russia is looking to North Korea for a large quantity of conventional weapons rather than sophisticated ones," said Go.

However, other analysts believe that in sufficient quantities, North Korean ammunition could still be useful to Russia.

"With ammo, quantity has a quality of its own," Michael Kofman, director of the Russia Studies Program at CNA, a US-based think tank, told VOA. "Lower quality doesn't mean 100% doesn't work."