WESTERN PERSPECTIVE
Ukraine says it hit two Russian military targets in occupied Crimea
Ukraine said on Thursday its air force conducted a strike on a Russian command post near the occupied city of Sevastopol more than 200 km (120 miles) from Kyiv-held territory, and hit a military unit in a separate strike on the Crimean peninsula.
Russia's Defence Ministry said its air defence units had downed a total of 36 Ukrainian drones over Crimea.
Ukraine's Air Force Commander, Mykola Oleshchuk, posted a video from social media on the Telegram messaging app showing smoke rising from an explosion near Sevastopol, a Crimean port that serves as the headquarters of Russia's Black Sea Fleet.
"Thanks again to the air force pilots and everyone who planned the operation for perfect combat work," he said.
He also published a screenshot of a social media post saying that a Russian military base in the city of Yevpatoria had been hit in a strike.
Mikhail Razvozhayev, the Moscow-installed governor of Sevastopol, described the attack as "the most massive in recent times".
One person was hospitalized after a piece of shrapnel struck a house, he wrote on Telegram.
In a later posting, Razvozhayev said three residents of a home hit by falling debris had been evacuated. Further evacuations might be necessary as forensic experts examine part of a missile that fell near a village.
Reuters could not independently verify the reports.
In a report just after midnight, Russia's Defence Ministry reported the downing of 36 drones in Crimea and one over the southern Russian region of Krasnodar.
The head administrative official in Saky, home to an air base north of Sevastopol, said several Ukrainian air attacks on the area had been repelled.
And Ukrainian bloggers and unofficial Telegram channels said Russian air defence units had been in action repelling Ukrainian attacks in the Kerch strait, on Crimea's eastern coast, and in the Russian Black Sea port of Novorossiysk.
The Russian defence ministry had earlier reported that its forces had destroyed 10 incoming missiles over the peninsula.
The Strategic Communications Department of the Armed Forces of Ukraine said a Russian command post had been hit near Sevastopol.
Ukraine has stepped up its attacks on the Crimean peninsula, which was seized and annexed by Moscow in 2014, seeking to destroy Russian military capabilities and force its fleet to pull back from the Black Sea.
Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has said Kyiv has managed to seize the initiative from Russia in the area.
** White House says Russia used missiles from North Korea to strike Ukraine
Russia recently used short-range ballistic missiles (SRBMs) sourced from North Korea to conduct multiple strikes against Ukraine, the White House said on Thursday, citing newly declassified intelligence.
National security spokesperson John Kirby told reporters the United States will raise the development with the United Nations Security Council.
Kirby called North Korea's arms transfer to Russia a "significant and concerning escalation" and said the United States would impose additional sanctions against those facilitating the arms deals.
Both Moscow and Pyongyang have denied conducting any arms deals, but vowed last year to deepen military relations.
The use of the missiles drew condemnation from Britain, as well as South Korea, which had reported in November that North Korea may have supplied SRBMs to Russia as part of a larger arms deal that also included anti-tank and anti-air missiles, artillery and mortar shells, and rifles.
"Our information indicates that the Democratic People's Republic of Korea recently provided Russia with ballistic missile launchers and several ballistic missiles," said Kirby, using the official name of North Korea.
On Dec. 30, he said, "Russian forces launched at least one of these North Korean ballistic missiles into Ukraine," adding that it appeared to have landed in open field.
Then on Tuesday Russia launched "multiple" North Korean missiles as part of a broader wave of heavy air strikes, Kirby said. Washington was still assessing the impact of those missiles.
Russia recently has launched some of its most intense strikes on Ukraine since the war began almost two years ago. Kyiv on Tuesday said that Russia had launched well over 300 attack drones and missiles of various kinds at cities across Ukraine since Friday.
HELPS RUSSIA
"Just like the artillery and munitions, this all helps prolong Russia's warfighting efforts," said Jenny Town, director of the Stimson Center's 38 North Program, which studies North Korea.
While the White House would not say specifically what type of missiles Pyongyang had sent to Russia, Kirby said they had a range of about 900 km (550 miles) and released a graphic that appeared to show KN-23 and KN-25 missiles.
Such missiles are new, solid-propellant SRBMs that North Korea began testing in 2019, said Ankit Panda, of the U.S.-based Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
"This is the first known combat use of these North Korean missiles," he said.
Joost Oliemans, a Dutch researcher and expert on North Korea's military, said images from Ukrainian social media accounts clearly show fragments of the ring housing the control vanes that are characteristic to North Korea's Hwasong-11 family of missiles, which includes the KN-23 and KN-25.
Kirby said the U.S. expects Russia and North Korea to learn from these launches, and anticipates Russia will use additional North Korean missiles to target Ukraine.
He said Iran has not delivered close-range ballistic missiles to Russia, but Washington believes Russia intends to purchase missile systems from Iran.
Moscow has been heavily reliant on Iran for drones and other weaponry for use against Ukraine.
RUSSIAN PERSPECTIVE
Putin approves citizenship for foreigners in Russian army
President Vladimir Putin has signed a decree granting the right to obtain Russian passports to foreigners who sign up for service in the country’s Armed Forces or other military units during the Ukraine conflict, the Kremlin reported on its website on Thursday.
Family members of such foreigners will also have the right to obtain Russian citizenship, according to the decree.
In addition, simplified naturalization rules will apply to foreigners dismissed from military service during the fighting for health reasons, upon reaching the age limit, or the expiration of their contract.
Applications to secure Russian ID for the foreign nationals are to be considered within a month after the relevant papers are submitted to the Interior Ministry. The term can be extended to up to three months in case some data needs additional verification, the document reads.
The move can help to solve the problem of extraditing foreigners who took part in the fighting for Russia to other countries, according to Aleksandr Khinshtein, the head of the State Duma Committee on Information Policy.
“Now the problem with the extradition of veterans of the military operation to other countries, where they are to be punished as ‘mercenaries’, will be resolved. Russia doesn’t extradite its citizens!” he wrote on Telegram.
Foreigners have been allowed to sign contracts with the Russian military since November 2022. However, a simplified path towards naturalization previously only applied to those who committed to at least one year of service.
Last month, Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu said that the number of “foreign volunteers” joining the country’s military units had increased sevenfold over the past year. He didn’t reveal the exact number.
Also on Thursday, the Russian Defense Ministry published data on foreign mercenaries fighting on the Ukrainian side. According to its estimates, over 13,500 soldiers of fortune have arrived in the country since the outbreak of the conflict between Moscow and Kiev in February 2022.
A total of 5,900 mercenaries have been killed, while over 5,600 have fled the battlefield. The number of foreigners in the ranks of the Ukrainian military currently stands at over 1,900, according to the ministry.
** White House not ready to report damage to weapons supplied to Kiev
The US administration is not ready to inform, what portion of US weapons transferred to Ukraine was damaged in combat actions, Coordinator for Strategic Communications of the US National Security Council John Kirby said at the regular briefing.
"That's a better question put to the Ukrainian defense forces, not the United States," Kirby noted. "We are working very, very hard to make sure that for every system that is provided to Ukraine, there's a measure of accountability for it, that we can assure the Congress and the American people that the material is being used appropriately on the field of battle. And we've seen no indication that it hasn't been, that there's been some wide-scale corruption or misuse by the Ukrainian military," the official said.
The US is tracking Ukrainian capabilities in the conflict with Russia, Kirby added. "We added expertise and individuals to the team in Kiev specifically for accountability purposes," he noted.
Reuters/RT/Tass