North Korea appears likely to skip the ASEAN Regional Forum(ARF) foreign ministers’ meeting this week, marking its first absence since joining the forum in 2000.

As of July 10, just a day before the meeting is scheduled to be held in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, neither the host nation nor Pyongyang has announced the participation of a North Korean delegation.

Diplomatic ties between North Korea and Malaysia were severed in 2021 after the 2017 assassination of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un’s half-brother, Kim Jong-nam, at Kuala Lumpur International Airport.

While North Korea has often clashed with South Korea at the ARF, particularly over the language used in the chair’s statement, the forum has also served as a rare venue for North Korean officials to meet their counterparts from South Korea, the U.S. and Japan.

Analysts say Pyongyang appears to be shifting its diplomatic focus away from multilateral engagement toward strategic bilateral partnerships, particularly with Russia, as Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov is set to visit North Korea immediately after the ARF.