The U.S. Department of Defense has said some 10,000 North Korean soldiers are on their way to the Russian region of Kursk, with a small number already there. Sources say they are to be used as infantry against the Ukrainian troops that have taken over parts of the region, Die Welt reports.
The Pentagon came out with this estimate on Monday, while South Korean intelligence says North Korea plans to send a total of “four brigades with 12,000 soldiers, including special forces” to the Ukrainian front to support Russian forces.
Zelensky says Ukraine’s armed forces will increase by 160,000 soldiers to help counter Russia’s recent territorial gains, a figure confirmed by Secretary of the National Security Council Oleksandr Lytvynenko in parliament in Kyiv on Tuesday. The mobilization will take place over three months.
According to Lytvynenko, a total of 1.05 million men have already been mobilized for military service since the start of Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine in February 2022.
Meanwhile, Russia’s Defense Ministry said on Tuesday that it had conducted new nuclear weapons exercises, supervised by Putin, including the firing of an intercontinental ballistic missile.
“All missiles hit their targets,” the ministry said. In a video, Defense Minister Andrey Belousov told the Russian head of state that one of the tests was to simulate “a massive nuclear strike (…) in response to an enemy nuclear strike.”
According to the ministry, the intercontinental ballistic missile was launched from the Kamchatka Peninsula in eastern Russia. Other missiles were launched from a submarine in the Barents Sea in the Arctic and from the Sea of Okhotsk.
