WESTERN PERSPECTIVE

Zelenskiy calls on allies 'not to hide', respond to North Korean involvement in war

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy called on allies on Tuesday "not to hide" and to respond to evidence of North Korean involvement in Russia's war in Ukraine.

He said in his nightly address that Ukraine had information about the preparation of two units - possibly up to 12,000 North Korean troops - to take part in the war alongside Russian forces.

"This is a challenge, but we know how to respond to this challenge. It is important that partners do not hide from this challenge as well," Zelenskiy said.

The head of Ukraine's Main Directorate of Intelligence told the U.S. publication "The War Zone" that Kyiv expected North Korean forces to turn up on Wednesday in Russia's southern Kursk region, where Ukrainian forces launched an incursion in August.

"We are waiting for the first units tomorrow in the Kursk direction, Lieutenant General Kyrylo Budanov told the media outlet. "It is unclear at the moment how many or how they will be equipped. We will see after a couple of days."

In his remarks, Zelenskiy said neither North Korea nor Russia took any account of the number of dead in a conflict.

"But all of us in the world have an equal interest in ending the war, not in prolonging it. We must therefore stop Russia and its accomplices," he said.

"If North Korea can intervene in a war in Europe, then the pressure on this regime is definitely insufficient."

British Defence Secretary John Healey said on Tuesday it was "highly likely" that North Korea had begun sending hundreds of troops to help Russia in the more than 2-1/2-year-old conflict.

A senior official at South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol's office said Seoul may consider directly supplying weapons to Ukraine as part of measures to counter military ties between North Korea and Russia.

A top U.S. diplomat said on Monday that Washington was consulting with its allies on the implications of North Korean involvement and added that such a development would be a "dangerous and highly concerning development" if true.

NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte said on Monday the dispatch of North Korean troops would significantly escalate the conflict.

RUSSIAN PERSPECTIVE

Ukrainian troops increasingly refusing orders – El Pais

Ukrainian servicemen are increasingly refusing to follow orders and fleeing their positions, accusing their leadership of assigning them suicide missions, the Spanish newspaper El Pais reported on Monday, citing several Ukrainian officers. 

The outlet claimed that soldiers from four brigades fighting near the besieged settlement of Kurakhovo in Russia’s Donetsk People’s Republic have claimed that “the future of the war is bleak for their interests because there are not enough replacements.”   

“Why are we retreating? Because we have no rotations, we don’t rest, we are demoralized,” one officer told the outlet, adding that there is a growing problem of Ukrainian soldiers fleeing their positions.  

“I had a friend, we called him England. He fought the entire war on the front line, in Robotino, Soledar, Kherson... He was exhausted, he couldn’t take it anymore and the commanders didn’t give him a break. A few days ago he left, just like that,” the officer said.  

A Ukrainian sergeant who goes by Churbanov also told the Spanish outlet that the shortage of soldiers had become the biggest problem facing the Ukrainian military, noting that servicemen often have to spend three months in their positions without rest or rotation.  

Another serviceman, identified as Alexander, who serves in the Territorial Defense Forces (TRO), also told El Pais that at one point the 116th TRO brigade near Kurakhovo staged a mass rebellion and refused to follow orders. After that, the whole brigade was supposedly transferred to Sumy Region, from where Kiev launched its incursion into Russia’s Kursk Region, according to the officer. 

A source within Russia’s security services has also confirmed to the TASS news agency that Ukraine’s 116th TRO brigade had indeed been transferred to participate in the Kursk incursion as punishment for its mutiny. According to a source cited by the outlet, Kiev was trying to “somehow correct the situation in Kursk Region at the expense of the already demoralized Ukrainian Armed Forces soldiers.” 

Alexander also told El Pais that there had been a high-profile case earlier this month where 100 soldiers of the 123rd TRO Brigade abandoned their positions near Ugledar several days before the city was captured by Russian forces. The officer explained that they did this to “announce that without sufficient training and weapons they were being assigned to a suicidal defense,” according to El Pais.  

Moscow has long characterized the hostilities in Ukraine as a US-initiated proxy war against Russia in which Ukrainian soldiers were being expended as “cannon fodder” with the complicity of their government.

Reuters/RT