WESTERN PERSPECTIVE

US consults allies about North Korea troops in Ukraine

It would be a "dangerous and highly concerning development" if North Korea was sending troops to help Russia in Ukraine, the United States said on Monday as South Korea and Britain warned of the high price Moscow would likely have to pay Pyongyang.

"We are consulting with our allies and partners on the implications of such a dramatic move," deputy U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Robert Wood told the 15-member United Nations Security Council. Russia invaded neighboring Ukraine in February 2022.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has accused Pyongyang of preparing to send 10,000 soldiers to Russia. Ukraine's U.N. Ambassador Sergiy Kyslytsya told the Security Council on Monday: "These troops are expected to be ready for war against Ukraine by November 1."

South Korea's spy agency said last week that North Korea had shipped 1,500 special forces troops to Russia's Far East for training and acclimatising at military bases and that they were likely to be deployed for combat in Ukraine.

"If true, this marks a dangerous and highly concerning development and an obvious deepening of the DPRK, Russia military relationship," Wood said of the reports, using North Korea's formal name - the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.

The Kremlin earlier on Monday declined to directly answer a query on whether North Korean troops were going to fight in Ukraine, but spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Moscow's cooperation with Pyongyang was not directed against third countries.

Russia's U.N. Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia accused Western countries of becoming "distracted by circulating scare mongering with Iranian, Chinese and Korean bogeymen, each one of which is more absurd than the one before."

Britain's U.N. Ambassador Barbara Woodward said it was "highly likely" that North Korea was sending troops.

"It seems that the harder (Russian President Vladimir) Putin finds it to recruit Russians to be cannon fodder, the more willing he is to rely on DPRK in his illegal war," she said. "We can be certain that the DPRK leadership will ask a high price from Russia in return."

South Korea's U.N. Ambassador Joonkook Hwang also warned the council of the implications of such a move.

"North Korea will expect a generous payoff from Moscow in return for its troop contribution. It could be either military or financial assistance. It could be nuclear weapons-related technology," he said.

North Korea has been under U.N. sanctions since 2006 for its nuclear and ballistic missile programs, and those measures have been strengthened over the years - with Russia's support.

RUSSIAN PERSPECTIVE

Ukrainians admit they’re running out of troops – Spanish media

A lack of manpower has now become the main problem for the Ukrainian army as it is forced to gradually yield ground to the Russian advance, El Pais reported on Monday, citing Defense Ministry officials and battlefield commanders.  

The Spanish daily’s reporters traveled to the frontline town of Kurakhovo, which is in Russia’s Donetsk People’s Republic but currently under Ukrainian control. According to the paper, Russian advances in the area mean that Kiev’s forces will soon have to retreat to avoid encirclement.   

The head of the Ukrainian Defense Ministry’s press team on the ground, speaking on condition of anonymity, told El Pais that Kiev’s main problem “is not weapons, it is the people.”   

“Nobody wants to go to the army. The brigades tell us they can’t rotate, they’re exhausted. There will be no people to fight soon,” he is cited as saying.  

Numerous Ukrainian servicemen interviewed by the outlet shared the same view. “Why are we retreating? Because we don’t have rotations, we don’t rest, we’re demoralized,”one Ukrainian officer fighting in Kurakhovo said.  

Yevgeny Churbanov, an officer in the 46th Airborne Brigade, said that nowadays his soldiers have to hold their positions for three months without any rotation, whereas a year ago it was never more than one month, while in the first year of the conflict, troops were typically rotated every four days.  

Ukrainian officials have long sounded the alarm about the depletion of the ranks of its military. To address the issue, earlier this year Kiev lowered the draft age from 27 to 25, and significantly tightened mobilization rules. Social media is rife with videos showing military patrols trying to detain potential recruits on the streets and in the shopping malls, with encounters often turning violent.   

Last week, Ukrainian media reported that, according to the country’s Prosecutor General’s Office, there have been nearly 60,000 criminal cases related to unauthorized abandonment of a military unit or place of service since 2022. Nearly 30,000 offenses related to desertion have been registered over the same period and the number of such transgressions has increased several-fold in recent months.  

In June, Russian President Vladimir Putin estimated Ukrainian losses at 50,000 troops per month, adding that Ukraine’s mobilization was not solving the manpower shortage.

Reuters/RT