Great Britain has provided a group of UN experts with satellite photos of Russian ships being loaded at a North Korean port. This is happening against the background of Pyongyangʼs accusations of supplying weapons to the Russian Federation.
This was written by The Guardian with reference to an unpublished report of the intelligence of Great Britain.
From September to December, British intelligence captured images of three Russian ships, the Maya, Angara and Maria, loading containers at the North Korean port of Najin (Rason) before transiting to Russian ports in the Far East. What exactly was loaded on them — Britain cannot say for sure.
"Russiaʼs use of North Korean weapons in Ukraine is a violation of several UN Security Council resolutions. It undermines international efforts to prevent nuclear proliferation and shows how desperate Russia has become after the failed invasion. This and other evidence provided to the UN Sanctions Committee should become the basis for an investigation into gross violations of international sanctions by the Russian Federation and North Korea," said the UN diplomat.
Along with the British report, the UN expert group also received the American one. In February, it may have published the first full report on North Koreaʼs supply of weapons to Russia.
The Royal Joint Institute for Defense Research identified two of the three ships, with the last identified by independent news website NK News. The Institute of Defense Studies showed that the volume of shipments from North Korea to Russia has increased — presumably, the Russian Federation has begun large-scale shipments of North Korean ammunition to continue the war in Ukraine.
The ships Maya, Angara and Maria have been under US sanctions since 2022 due to ties with the shipping company of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation "Oboronlogistika LLC", which participated in the occupation of Crimea and helped in the conduct of the war.
Earlier, the Kharkiv prosecutorʼs office discovered alleged fragments of North Korean-made Iskander missiles. A statement by members of the Security Council, including the United Kingdom and the United States, said: "These horrific attacks [on Kharkiv] were carried out, in particular, using ballistic missiles and ballistic missile launchers acquired from [North Korea]."
The military cooperation between Russia and North Korea is "unprecedented," according to the White House National Security Councilʼs senior director for arms control, Pranaya Waddy.
How did North Korea and Russia adjust supplies?
Back in August, experts from the British Royal Defense Research Institute (RUSI) recorded two Russian dry cargo ships Angara and Maria delivering several hundred containers to North Korean ports, and then taking others out. During the flights, they hid their geolocation by turning off the transponders. According to analysts, the end point of the container route was the ammunition depot in Tikhoretsk, Krasnodar Krai, 200 km from the border with Ukraine.
RUSI data is also confirmed by journalists of the Dossier publication. According to their information, a load of 50 tons of rockets with bursting charges was transported in the hold of the Angara. However, in the shipʼs documents, which the journalists got acquainted with, the DPRK is not mentioned once. At the same time, the destination is often indicated as Streletskaya Bay, on the shore of which a Russian military base is located.
What is known about missiles from North Korea?
On January 5, the Air Force of the Ukrainian Armed Forces did not confirm Russiaʼs use of ballistic missiles from the DPRK. Yuriy Ignat, the spokesman of the Polish Armed Forces, said that experts are studying the wreckage, but it will take time. However, on January 4, Western media wrote that Russia received a batch of ballistic missiles from North Korea (several dozen) and launchers for them. On the same day, the United States officially announced that Russia had short-range ballistic missiles from North Korea and had launched them into Ukraine — the first on December 30, 2023 (falling on Zaporizhzhia) and several more on January 2 during a massive missile attack.
On January 10, South Koreaʼs ambassador to the UN said that North Korea is using Ukraine as a testing ground for its ballistic missiles with the help of Russia. The next day, the Prosecutor Generalʼs Office reported that they had the first evidence of Russiaʼs use of North Korean-made missiles.
On January 21, the DPRK announced a possible visit by Putin. Last week, the head of the North Korean Foreign Ministry was in Moscow. There, she held a meeting to strengthen "strategic and tactical cooperation" between the two countries to establish a "new multipolar world order." At that meeting, the invitation was extended to Putin, and now he has accepted.
- For Russia, the DPRK is an important ally. The head of the Ukrainian intelligence Kyrylo Budanov said that North Korea is the largest supplier of weapons and ammunition to the Russian Federation and without its help "the situation would be catastrophic" for the occupying forces.