Volodymyr Zelensky said he was “ready” on Sunday evening to hand over to Pyongyang, in exchange for Ukrainian soldiers imprisoned in Russia, the two North Korean soldiers that kyiv says it captured in the Russian region of Kursk. “Ukraine is ready to hand over its soldiers to Kim Jong-un if he can organize their exchange for our fighters who are detained in Russia,” the Ukrainian president wrote on his X account.
kyiv announced on Saturday that it had taken prisoner two wounded North Korean soldiers in the Kursk region, where Ukrainian forces have occupied several hundred km2 since last August. An assertion that Moscow refused to comment on this Monday, January 13: “We don’t know what corresponds to reality in this,” brushed off Kremlin spokesperson Dmitri Peskov.
Information to remember
⇒ Russia accuses Ukraine of attacking TurkStream gas pipeline infrastructure
⇒ Kremlin refuses to comment on capture of two North Korean soldiers
⇒ The Russian army claims new conquests
Russia accuses Ukraine of attacking TurkStream gas pipeline infrastructure
Russia accused Ukraine on Monday of having attacked with a drone a gas distribution station of the TurkStream gas pipeline, the only route for transporting Russian gas to Europe since transit via Ukrainian territory was stopped on January 1. “The kyiv regime attempted to attack with nine drones a gas distribution station of the TurkStream gas pipeline in the Krasnodar region (southwest of Russia), “in order to suspend gas deliveries to European countries” , said the Russian army in a press release, ensuring that all the devices were shot down, without hindering the operation of the station or causing injuries.
Inaugurated in 2020, the TurkStream gas pipeline, capable of transporting 31.5 billion cubic meters of gas each year, is made up of two parallel tubes some 930 km long which connect Anapa, in the Krasnodar region in Russia, to Kiyiköy in Turkey (northwest). Passing under the Black Sea, it allows Russia to supply southeastern and southern Europe by bypassing Ukraine, initially a key country for the transit of Russian gas delivered to Europe. However, deliveries of Russian gas to Europeans via Ukraine definitively ceased on January 1, after the expiration of a contract signed between kyiv and Moscow at the end of 2019 and maintained despite the Russian offensive in Ukraine underway for around three years. .
With the end of this transit and more than two years after the sabotage of the Nord Stream tubes in the Baltic Sea in September 2022, Europe is now only supplied with Russian gas by TurkStream, and its Balkan Stream extension.
North Korean soldiers taken prisoner by Ukraine: Kremlin refuses to comment
The Kremlin on Monday refused to comment on the statement by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky who said he was “ready” to hand over to Pyongyang two North Korean soldiers, captured in the Russian region of Kursk where Ukraine controls several hundred square kilometers. “We cannot comment on it in any way,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters. “We do not know what corresponds to reality in this,” he added, while Moscow has never admitted nor denied the deployment on the Kursk front of thousands of North Korean soldiers, as ‘say kyiv and its South Korean, American and European allies.
Some 300 North Korean soldiers were killed out of the thousands deployed, a South Korean MP said on Monday, citing Seoul’s intelligence service. “Notes found on dead soldiers indicate that North Korean authorities pressured them to commit suicide” before being captured, including by having themselves “blown up,” continued Lee Seong-kweun, member of the intelligence committee in Parliament.
The Russian army claims the capture of Pichtchané, a mining village near Pokrovsk
The Russian army claimed Monday the capture of Pichtchané, a mining village near Pokrovsk in eastern Ukraine and an area where Moscow’s forces have been progressing slowly for several months despite heavy losses. The Russian Defense Ministry said it had “liberated” this town, located less than 10 km southwest of Pokrovsk and which is home to a major coal mining site, where production had to be stopped because of the fights.
Already on Sunday, Moscow had claimed the capture of two localities in eastern Ukraine, where it has been progressing slowly but steadily for months against fewer Ukrainian troops.
Russia: 9 years in prison for treason for the benefit of Ukraine
A Siberian resident was sentenced to 9 years in prison for treason for Ukraine, the local branch of the Russian Security Service (FSB) announced on Monday. The regional court of Khanty-Mansiysk (Western Siberia) found Sergei Lochakov guilty of transferring money to finance the Ukrainian armed forces and sentenced him to 9 years in prison “in a severe regime”, the FSB said , quoted by the RIA Novosti news agency. “Being hostile to Russian foreign and domestic policy”, this resident of Surgut made contact on Telegram with an unidentified person, before transferring funds for the Ukrainian army, according to the same source.
Since the start of the Russian offensive in Ukraine in February 2022, trials for “treason”, “terrorism”, “sabotage” or “espionage”, which always carry heavy sentences, have multiplied in Russia. Furthermore, thousands of people have been sanctioned, threatened or imprisoned because of their opposition to the conflict in Ukraine.