KYIV: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Friday that North Korean troops were back on the front line in Russia’s Kursk region, after reports Moscow had withdrawn them due to heavy losses.
More than 10,000 soldiers from the reclusive state were sent to Russia last year to help it fight back a shock Ukrainian offensive into the border region, according to South Korean and Western intelligence.
A Ukrainian military spokesman told AFP last Friday that Kyiv had not encountered activity or clashes with North Korean troops for three weeks.
“There have been new assaults in the Kursk operation areas... the Russian army and North Korean soldiers have been brought in again,” Zelensky said in his evening address.
The Ukrainian leader said a “significant number” of opposing troops had been “destroyed.”
“We are talking about hundreds of Russian and North Korean soldiers,” he added.
Kyiv captured dozens of border settlements in its Kursk assault six months ago, the first time a foreign army had crossed into Russian territory since World War II.
The North Korean deployment, never officially confirmed by Moscow or Pyongyang, was supposed to reinforce the Russian army and help them expel Ukraine’s troops.
But as of February Ukraine still holds swathes of Russian territory, something Zelensky sees as a bargaining chip in any future negotiations with Moscow.
Zelensky says North Korean troops back on Russia front line
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Zelensky says North Korean troops back on Russia front line
- “There have been new assaults in the Kursk operation areas... the Russian army and North Korean soldiers have been brought in again,” Zelensky said
- The Ukrainian leader said a “significant number” of opposing troops had been “destroyed“
EU to suspend 93 billion euro retaliatory trade package against US for 6 months
- “With the removal of the tariff threat by the US we can now return to the important business,” Gill said
- The Commission will soon make a proposal “to roll over our suspended countermeasures”
BRUSSELS: The European Commission said on Friday it would propose suspending for another six months an EU package of retaliatory trade measures against the US worth 93 billion euros ($109.19 billion) that would otherwise kick in on February 7.
The package, prepared in the first half of last year when the European Union was negotiating a trade deal with the United States, was put on hold for six months when Brussels and Washington agreed on a joint statement on trade in August 2025.
US President Donald Trump’s threat last week to impose new tariffs on eight European countries over Washington’s push to acquire Greenland had made the retaliatory package a handy tool for the EU to use had Trump followed through on his threat.
“With the removal of the tariff threat by the US we can now return to the important business of implementing the joint EU-US statement,” Commission spokesman Olof Gill said.
The Commission will soon make a proposal “to roll over our suspended countermeasures, which are set to expire on February 7,” Gill said, adding the measures would be suspended for a further six months.
“Just to make absolutely clear — the measures would remain suspended, but if we need them at any point in the future, they can be unsuspended,” Gill said.
