WESTERN PERSPECTIVE

Russia seeks arms-for-food deal with North Korea, US alleges

The White House on Thursday said it has new evidence that Russia is looking again to North Korea for weapons to fuel the war in Ukraine, this time in a deal that would provide Pyongyang with needed food and other commodities in return.

It’s the latest accusation that Russia, desperate for weaponry and restricted by sanctions and export controls, is turning to “rogue” nations to help it continue to prosecute the 13-month-old war.

“As part of this proposed deal, Russia would receive over two dozen kinds of weapons and munitions from Pyongyang,” White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said. “We also understand that Russia is seeking to send a delegation to North Korea and that Russia is offering North Korea food in exchange for munitions.”

The administration has previously declassified intelligence to present evidence that Iran sold hundreds of attack drones to Russia over the summer and that the Wagner Group, a private Russian military company, has taken delivery of arms from North Korea to help bolster its forces as they fight side-by-side with Russian troops in Ukraine.

Experts believe the food situation in North Korea is the worst it has been under Kim Jong Un’s 11-year rule, but they still say they see no signs of imminent famine or mass deaths. Kim vowed to strengthen state control over agriculture and take a spate of other steps to increase grain production, North Korean state media reported earlier this month.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken said last month that U.S. intelligence suggested China was considering providing arms and ammunition to Russia, though White House officials have said they have yet to see evidence of Beijing following through with weapons delivery.

The publicizing of Russia’s efforts to get weapons from North Korea is just the latest example of the Biden administration loosening restrictions on intelligence findings and making them public over the course of the grinding war in Ukraine.

The administration has said it has sought to disseminate the intelligence findings so allies and the public remain clear-eyed about Moscow’s intent and Russian President Vladimir Putin thinks twice about his actions.

Earlier Thursday, the Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control announced sanctions against a Slovakian national, Ashot Mkrtychev, alleging he attempted to facilitate arms deals between Russia and North Korea.

Kirby said Mkrtychev is at the center of the new North Korea-Russia deal, which has yet to be consummated. He added that the U.S. does not have evidence that Mkrtychev was involved in the earlier transfer of weapons to Russia’s Wagner Group, whose mercenaries have been in the center of a monthslong battle for the eastern Ukrainian city of Bakhmut.

Between the end of 2022 and early 2023, Treasury said Mkrtychev worked with North Korean officials to obtain over two dozen kinds of weapons and munitions for Russia in exchange for commercial aircraft, raw materials and commodities to be sent to North Korea.

Mkrtychev worked with a Russian citizen to find commercial aircraft to delivers goods to North Korea in the exchange.

“Russia has lost over 9,000 pieces of heavy military equipment since the start of the war, and thanks in part to multilateral sanctions and export controls, Putin has become increasingly desperate to replace them,” Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said in a statement. “Schemes like the arms deal pursued by this individual show that Putin is turning to suppliers of last resort like Iran and the DPRK.”

North Korea, an outlier on the global stage, has sought to enhance relations with Russia since its invasion of Ukraine brought an avalanche of sanctions from the West and broad international condemnation.

Any arms deal with Russia would be a violation of U.N. resolutions that ban North Korea from exporting to or importing weapons from other countries.

North Korea is the only nation aside from Russia and Syria to recognize the independence of Russia-backed separatist territories, Donetsk and Luhansk, in eastern Ukraine.

RUSSIAN PERSPECTIVE

Belarus ready to host Russian strategic nuclear weapons – President

Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko mulled the possibility of his nation hosting Russia’s strategic nuclear weapons during an annual address to parliament on Friday. His words came as Moscow announced its plans to deploy its tactical nuclear weapons to Belarus.

"I and [Russian President Vladimir] Putin can decide and deploy strategic nuclear weapons here, if need be," Lukashenko told lawmakers, adding that the move would show the two nations' readiness to defend their "sovereignty and independence."

"We will stop at nothing to protect our nations, our states, our people," the Belarusian leader said, adding that the move would likely serve as an effective deterrent against any hostile moves by the US and its allies. The Belarusian president expressed his hope that strategic nuclear weapons deployment to his country would "sober up all the hawks across the pond for a long time."

Lukashenko also said he had already ordered the military to restore the facilities used to store Topol intercontinental ballistic missiles and served as their potential launch sites in Soviet times. According to the president, Belarus kept all the facilities, which he called "complex engineering structures."

Russia currently uses Topol-M and Yars intercontinental ballistic missiles – upgraded versions of the Soviet-made Topol missiles developed in the 1980s. The missiles could be silo-based or placed on mobile, self-propelled wheeled platforms. Some of the mobile versions of the original Topol missiles were deployed to Belarus during the Soviet era.

The Belarusian president previously and repeatedly advocated deploying Russia’s nuclear weapons to his country, citing a threat posed by the West. In October 2022, he pointed to "nuclear sharing" talks between Washington and Warsaw, warning that nuclear weapons could be placed in Poland, which borders Belarus.

Last week. Putin announced the deployment of Russia’s tactical weapons to Belarus by saying that a special storage facility for them would be ready by July 1. Moscow explained its decision by pointing to London’s plans to supply Kiev with depleted uranium munitions.

Russia blasted the UK’s move as a sign of "absolute recklessness, irresponsibility, and impunity" on the part of London and Washington.

Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky linked Moscow’s decision to deploy nuclear weapons to Belarus to some alleged "failures" during a meeting between Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping earlier in March.

"A signal of Russia deploying its nuclear weapons on Belarusian territory would indicate that [Putin’s] meeting with China’s [leader] had failed," Zelensky said during a press conference with the Moldovan president as well as the prime ministers of Croatia, Slovenia and Slovakia in Kiev. He did not elaborate on the particular way in which the two events are connected in his view.

Putin and Xi signed more than a dozen documents on increased cooperation in fields ranging from trade and industry to science and the military during the visit. Later, Moscow confirmed that the two nations were in the final stages of striking a gas megadeal, while Beijing said that it aimed for closer defense cooperation with Moscow. The Pentagon also described Xi’s visit to Moscow as a "very troubling message."

** Top US general skeptical of Ukraine's prospects

Ukraine’s stated objective of expelling all Russian “invaders” is unlikely to be achieved this year, General Mark Milley, chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, said in an interview on Friday. His comments came as Kiev both announced a grand spring offensive and complained about not having all the weapons needed for it.

President Vladimir Zelensky said that Ukraine’s objective is “to kick every Russian out of Russian-occupied Ukraine,” Milley told the outlet Defense One. “And that is a significant military task. Very, very difficult military task.”

“I'm not saying it can't be done,” Milley added. “I don't think it's likely to be done in the near term for this year.”

He qualified his words by adding that the Ukrainians “certainly have a right to that” and are “on the moral high ground.” Milley also insisted that Russia had “failed” both strategically and tactically.

This is not the first time Milley has voiced skepticism about a Ukrainian military victory. At a press conference in November, he said the probability of Kiev taking Crimea “anytime soon is not high.”

Earlier this week, Ukraine’s Defense Minister Alexey Reznikov said that Kiev’s forces would use the newly delivered German Leopard tanks to attack in multiple directions, starting in April or May.

Zelensky himself was not so certain, saying that Kiev was awaiting more deliveries of weapons and ammunition from the West, and calling the situation on the front “unfavorable.”

Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Dmitry Kuleba has urged the US and its allies to continue sending Ukraine weapons and money, even if the offensive doesn’t achieve 100% of its objectives. Meanwhile, his deputy Andrey Melnik told the German outlet Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung that the attack isn’t quite ready just yet.

“We don’t want to start a counteroffensive until we’re prepared,” he said. “We have approximately 50-60 Western tanks now, but the Russians have been able to produce ten tanks a day. This means we will be unable to achieve a decisive advantage on the battlefield for a long time to come.”

Melnik’s remarks came in the context of a call for more weapons, as he argued that the West should not draw a “red line” at supplying Ukraine with fighter jets.

The US and its allies have sent over $100 billion worth of weapons, ammunition and equipment to Kiev by the end of 2022, according to the Russian Defense Ministry. Milley told Defense One that the US military industry will take “probably several years” to replenish its stockpiles and meet the Pentagon’s needs. It’s “not going to be done by magic overnight” and will be “very expensive,” he added.

** US has small stockpile of long-range missiles to hand them over to Ukraine — Pentagon

The United States has an small stockpile of long-range missiles, which limits the possibility of handing them over to Ukraine, Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff General Mark Milley said in an online interview with the Defense One media outlet.

Asked whether Washington was planning to supply Ukraine with ATACMS (Army Tactical Missile System) missiles with a strike range of up to 300 kilometers, Milley replied "Well, there's a policy decision to date not to, so far. And I would never predict anything on the table, off the table, for the future."

"But from a military standpoint, we have relatively few ATACMS, we do have to make sure that we maintain our own munitions inventories, as well," he continued. "And the range of the weapon - I think there's a little bit of overstating of what an ATACMS can do and can't do."

"You're looking at a single shot, so think of a musket versus a repeating rifle. Whereas the GMLRS fires six shots, and ATACMs fires one. Now the range of the ATACMS is longer, but there's other systems they can get you that range," the high-ranking military official said.

"There’s UAVs, for example, that could do it, and the Brits have a couple of systems. So, those are some things that we're looking at to give them a little bit more legs. But right now, we're not providing the ATACMS," Milley added.

Ukraine repeatedly asked the United States to provide it with ATACMS missiles, but was refused.

AP/RT/TASS