kyiv sees Pyongyang as Russia’s most dangerous ally

Relations between Moscow and Pyongyang are of particular concern to kyiv. Among Russia’s allies, North Korea represents “the biggest problem” for Ukraine due to massive deliveries of artillery shells to the Russians, who use them on the front lines, Ukrainian military intelligence chief Kyrylo Budanov said on Saturday.

“Of all these allies of Russia, our biggest problem comes from North Korea, because with the volume of military products that it supplies, it really affects the intensity of the fighting,” he said at a Yalta European Strategy conference in kyiv.

Pyongyang denies arms deliveries

North Korean authorities are “supplying huge volumes of artillery ammunition […] “This is critical for us,” said the influential General Budanov. “Unfortunately, […] “We can’t do anything about it at the moment,” he admitted. “The fact that they are also supplying ballistic missiles is unpleasant, but” less serious because of their smaller quantity.

The United States and South Korea have accused Pyongyang of supplying munitions and missiles to Russia to support its invasion of Ukraine, which has been ongoing since February 2022. Pyongyang rejects the accusations, but the investigative group Conflict Armament Research said this week that debris analysis shows that “missiles produced this year in North Korea are being used in Ukraine.”

General Budanov also said that Russia had “made considerable progress” in the production of Iskander ballistic missiles and increased “several times” the number of gliding aerial bombs, weapons that the Russian military uses to strike civilian and military targets in Ukraine. “We now clearly see the massive use of Iskander-M missiles” across Ukraine, while “guided bombs pose a huge problem on the front lines” where they are launched against Ukrainian troops.

Does Russia want the war to end before 2026?

He nevertheless estimated that Russia, currently on the offensive on the front in Ukraine, would try to end the war “before 2026” to avoid seeing its positions weakened due to the accumulation of economic problems caused in particular by Western sanctions and those of mobilization against a backdrop of significant losses on the front.

Kyrylo Budanov, whose department is known for daring operations deep inside Russia, also dismissed Western fears of an escalation in Europe’s worst armed conflict since World War II. He called on the West “not to be afraid” to better arm Ukraine.

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