A new bridge linking China and North Korea is set to open on Thursday, more than a decade after the Chinese side was completed, in the latest indication of closer ties between the two countries.

China's official Xinhua news agency reported on Wednesday that the two sides would hold a ceremony to mark the opening of the New Yalu River Bridge.

The massive, three-kilometre bridge will connect the northeastern Chinese city of Dandong with the North Korean city of Sinuiju.

The bridge was originally scheduled to become operational in 2014, but the deadline passed without any opening. By September that year, the North Korean side ended at a dirt ramp, with no customs or immigration facilities in sight.

The delay prompted an unusually critical report in the Global Times, a newspaper affiliated with the Chinese Communist Party, which quoted Dandong residents expressing frustration over the stalled project. They had hoped the bridge would bring economic benefits to their border city.

Foreign analysts suggested at the time that Pyongyang was concerned about China's growing economic influence in North Korea.

China remains North Korea's largest trading partner and a major ally, although Beijing has expressed disapproval of Pyongyang's missile tests over the years.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un visited Beijing in September 2025 to attend a military parade marking the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II. It was the first time in decades that a North Korean leader had attended a Chinese military parade.

The only existing bridge between the two countries was built in 1937, when Korea was under Japanese colonial rule. It carries a railway line as well as cars and trucks, but road traffic can cross in only one direction at a time.