Sending military units from North Korea on the front in Ukraine would be a sign of Russia's desperation more than two and a half years after the start of the Russian invasion of the neighboring country, Finnish President Alexander Stubb told Reuters in Berlin, BTA reported.
He is in the German capital on the occasion of the celebrations and meetings that started yesterday for the 25th anniversary of the founding of the Nordic Diplomatic Corps there, which houses the embassies of Finland, Sweden, Norway, Denmark and Iceland.
Representatives of Ukraine and South Korea have accused North Korea of mobilizing thousands of military personnel to help the Russian army in Ukraine. Last week, South Korean intelligence announced that North Korea had sent 1,500 members of its special forces for training and acclimatization at a military base in the Russian Far East, and that they would most likely join the fighting in Ukraine on Moscow's side.
The Kremlin declined to directly answer the question of whether North Korean soldiers would fight on Russia's side in Ukraine.
"We see how desperate Russia really is," Stubb said in Berlin. "Her allies in the world are not that many. It relies on Iran's weapons, it relies on North Korea's soldiers. "How much worse can it get?" he added.
The deployment of military units from North Korea in the ranks of the Russian army in Ukraine would constitute an "escalation" of the conflict, noted the Finnish head of state. His country, which shares a 1,340 kilometer border with Russia, joined NATO last spring, making a historic shift to neutrality over Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
Stubb, who is due to make a state visit to China from October 28 to 31, announced that he would tell Chinese President Xi Jinping that no peace agreement could be reached without Ukraine's participation. He will urge China not to provide assistance to Russia in any way, "especially through raw materials and dual-use products that can be used in weapons production".
US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen's announcement that her country will provide around $20 billion to Ukraine paves the way for the European Union to provide €18 billion in aid, German Finance Minister Christian Lindner said last night. , quoted by Reuters and BTA.
"We are on the verge of a breakthrough in our support for Ukraine," he said in New York before leaving for Washington, where he will participate today in the annual meetings of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank.