While the former North Korean leader Kim Jong-il was a regular visitor to the Chinese embassy, his son reportedly avoided direct contact with Beijing’s officials in Pyongyang as bilateral ties were tested by the North’s nuclear and ballistic missile programmes and China’s support for UN security council sanctions. Chinese diplomats have rushed to the scene of the accident in North Hwanghae province, which happened on Sunday evening, the ministry added, without saying how many people had either been injured or died. Mr. Kim arrived at the Chinese Embassy at 6:30 a.m. Monday, the day after the crash, to “express his deep sympathy” and extend his condolences to Chinese President Xi Jinping, the official Korean Central News Agency said in a Tuesday report. Kim Jong-un, left, meets China's ambassador to North Korea Li Jinjun, second from right (Korean Central News Agency/Korea News Service via AP) China’s Foreign Ministry said a medical team and diplomats were sent to help. The secretive communist state requires that all visitors are accompanied by minders and it is thought this was the case with those who were killed. Chinese tourists make up the vast majority of visitors to North Korea, where they often pay homage at sites related to China’s participation in the 1950-53 Korean War. REUTERS 20/20 Women, photographed from the Chinese side of the border, are seen through binoculars fixed on a building on the Chinese side of the border for sightseers to look across to North Korea, as they cross the bridge from Namyang in North Korea towards the town of Tumen in China, Reuters

China remains Pyongyang’s largest trading partner, although commerce between the two nations has dropped off by about 90 per cent under United Nations sanctions. Chinese state broadcaster CCTV showed the mangled wreckage in the dark with rain falling and rescue vehicles on the scene.
A bus crash in North Hwanghae, North Korea, kills 32 Chinese tourists and four North Koreans. A further two people are seriously injured.