100 North Korean soldiers reportedly injured as Russia intensifies attacks on Ukraine-held Kursk
- 17 December, 14:44
Russia has stepped up offensives on its Ukraine-held border Kursk region and also increased pressure on eastern Donetsk region, Commander-in-Chief Oleksandr Syrskyi said on Tuesday.
In an online address to the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities held in Lviv, Syrskyi said Russia’s intensive offensive in Kursk continues for the third day with the use of North Korean mercenaries deployed in the area. Syrskyi said North Korean troops have suffered heavy losses in the fighting, adding that Ukrainian soldiers are holding the defences.
On the same day, The Main Intelligence Directorate of Ukraine claimed 50 North Korean troops had been killed and 47 others were injured during the hostilities in Kursk in the past three days. Earlier, on Monday Ukrainian military officials revealed that 30 North Korean mercenaries were killed or wounded in the fighting in Kursk region. The figures provided by Kyiv have not been confirmed by Moscow. Meanwhile, Ukrainian Telegram channels published videos on Tuesday of what appears to be North Korean soldiers receiving treatment in a hospital in Russia. The Telegram channels claimed 100 injured North Korean mercenaries were hospitalized in Kursk and that an entire floor of the hospital was allocated for these fighters.
Russia has deployed up to 12,000 North Korean soldiers in Kursk since Ukraine’s large-scale incursion into the region in early August. Kremlin and Pyongyang have bolstered military alliance since Russia’s full-fledged invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
According to Western media, Ukraine has lost around half of the territory initially captured in Russia’s Kursk region that President Volodymyr Zelenskiy describes as a “buffer zone”. Ukraine seeks to hold on to the region until the signing of the peace deal with Russia that is likely to happen after Donald Trump’s inauguration in late January.
