By New York Post (World News) | Created at 2024-11-22 15:25:05 | Updated at 2024-11-22 20:50:37
5 hours ago
A senior North Korean general was wounded by a Ukrainian military strike in Russia, according to Western officials — the Hermit Kingdom’s first high-ranking casualty since joining the war.
The unidentified general was reportedly wounded in a military strike in Russia’s Kursk region, officials told The Wall Street Journal.
It’s not exactly clear how or when he was wounded.
Some 10,000 North Korean troops have been deployed to the front in Kursk, where Russia has suffered heavy losses of late forcing back Ukrainian troops who launched a massive offensive there and reclaimed much territory in August.
North Korean Supreme Leader Kim Jong Un could deploy as many as 100,000 troops to assist Russia in the war, which could bolster Russian President Vladimir Putin’s fighting force by 20%.
Western officials estimate has 700,000 Russian troops have been killed or wounded since the war began in February 2022.
Pyongyang had sent a senior officer, Col. Gen. Kim Yong Bok, to Russia to oversee the North Korean effort to coordinate with the Russian military leaders — however, he was not expected to see any combat action, according to the Wall Street Journal.
National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said last month that North Korean soldiers fighting against Ukraine are “fair game and fair targets” for Ukrainian forces.
The arrival of the North Korean troops prompted President Biden to give Ukraine permission to use the long-range ATACMS to strike deeper into Russia — a potentially major escalation in the conflict, which just saw its deadliest year yet as it surpassed its 1,000th day.
The missiles were fired for the first time at targets in Russia’s Bryansk region on Tuesday.
On Wednesday, Ukrainian forces launched a second long-range assault with UK-supplied Storm Shadow which struck an estate in Marino, a small town in Kursk about 20 miles from the front lines in the province.
The Kremlin responded on Thursday, firing a brand new intermediate-range ballistic missile at the central Ukrainian city of Dnipro.
Putin claimed in a televised address that US air defense systems will not be able to stop the new missiles, called Oreshnik, which he claimed fly ten times faster than the speed of sound.
“This was new type of lethal capability that was deployed on the battlefield, so that was certainly of concern,” Pentagon deputy press secretary Sabrina Singh said, noting that the missile could carry either conventional or nuclear warheads.
The US was notified ahead of the launch through nuclear risk reduction channels, she said.
Putin earlier this week also lowered the threshold for allowing for a nuclear strike, updating Russia’s doctrine to allow a potential nuclear response by Moscow — even in response to a conventional attack on Russia by any nation that is supported by a nuclear power.
