Several tens of thousands of Russian and North Korean soldiers are preparing for a major assault against Ukrainian forces, warns an American official cited by CNN and the New York Times this Sunday. Their goal? Retake the Russian region of Kursk, attacked by Ukraine in August.
This assault, according to this American source, is planned in the coming days. According to the New York Times, this new military operation would mobilize no less than 50,000 soldiers. Currently, North Korean soldiers are training with Russians in the eastern part of the Kursk region, according to the American daily.
This gathering of forces in the Russian camp would have been done without stripping the front in Ukraine, specifies the New York Times, citing analyzes from the United States. The Ukrainian authorities already say they expect an attack very soon, including North Korean troops.
Thousands of North Korean soldiers are already deployed in the Russian region where the Ukrainian army controls a few hundred square kilometers since its surprise operation launched on August 6. According to US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, these North Korean soldiers are equipped with Russian uniforms and trained in artillery, drones, infantry operations including trench cleaning, showing that Moscow “has indeed 'intent to use these forces in front-line operations'.
This Thursday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said that North Korean soldiers had already “taken part in hostilities” and suffered “losses”. A question evaded by the Kremlin this Friday.
Ukrainian troops struggling
North Korea has never sent troops to fight abroad, particularly for fear that they would defect or make disturbing comparisons between foreign armies and their own.
On the front, Ukrainian troops are struggling, suffering from their inferiority in weapons and personnel, and retreating in multiple sectors in eastern Ukraine, where Russian troops have been advancing for months. On Sunday, the Moscow region was the target of a “massive drone attack”, in response to another drone attack targeting kyiv, targeted almost daily for a month.
Ukraine says it is carrying out its strikes on Russia, which usually mainly target energy sites, in response to the deadly Russian bombings which have destroyed its infrastructure and devastated its cities since Vladimir Putin's launch of the large-scale assault on the Ukraine in February 2022.
The West, however, refuses to authorize kyiv to strike deep into Russian territory with the weapons it supplies and to shoot down Russian missiles targeting Ukrainian cities, for fear that this would lead to an escalation. And with Donald Trump's American presidential victory, the question arises of the sustainability of American support, which has enabled Ukraine to resist Russian troops for more than two years.
“The situation in the theater of hostilities is not in favor of the kyiv regime, the West has a choice: continue its financing (of Ukraine) and the destruction of the Ukrainian population or admit the existing realities and begin to negotiate,” warned the head of the Russian Security Council and former Defense Minister, Sergei Shoigu, this week.
