Ukraine-Russia war latest: Kyiv interrogates captured North Korean soldiers as Trump-Putin call ‘expected soon’

Russia said on Monday it had downed nine Ukrainian drones that tried to attack part of the infrastructure of the TurkStream gas pipeline, through which Russian gas flows to Turkey and Europe.

The Russian defence ministry said the attack was aimed against a compressor station in the Krasnodar region of southern Russia, but the facility was working normally and there were no casualties.

There was no immediate comment from Ukraine.

TurkStream and Blue Stream, which run under the Black Sea to Turkey, are Russia’s last routes for supplying pipeline gas to Europe, after Ukraine at the start of the year refused to renew a five-year transit deal that had allowed Russia to keep pumping gas across its territory despite the war between the two neighbours.

The Russian statement said falling fragments from one drone had caused minor damage to the building and equipment of a gas metering station at the compressor, but emergency teams had quickly repaired it.

Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump are expected to speak in the coming days or weeks, a top Trump adviser said.

Mr Trump, who will return as US president next week, styles himself as a master dealmaker and has vowed to swiftly end the war in Ukraine but not set out how he might achieve that.

Answering a question about contacts between Mr Trump and Mr Putin, US Congressman Mike Waltz, the incoming national security adviser, said: “I do expect a call for, at least in the coming days and weeks. So, that would be a step and we’ll take it from there.” He, however, said it was unrealistic to aim to expel Russian soldiers from every inch of Ukrainian territory.

He added that the war had become a World War One-style “meat grinder of people and resources” with “World War Three consequences”, according to ABC.

“Everybody knows that this has to end somehow diplomatically,” Mr Waltz, a Trump loyalist who also served in the National Guard as a colonel, told ABC.

“I just don’t think it’s realistic to say we’re going to expel every Russian from every inch of Ukrainian soil, even Crimea. President Trump has acknowledged that reality, and I think it’s been a huge step forward that the entire world is acknowledging that reality. Now let’s move forward.”

Volodymyr Zelensky said Kyiv was ready to return the North Korean soldiers that his forces allegedly captured last week if Kim Jong Un could facilitate their exchange for Ukrainian prisoners of war.

Boris Johnson, who was prime minister when Vladimir Putin launched Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022, is among those to have recently suggested that British troops should form part of a European force sent to guard Ukraine’s border under any future ceasefire with Russia.

France’s Emmanuel Macron reportedly travelled to Warsaw in December to discuss the idea with Donald Tusk, as Europe braces for Donald Trump’s incoming US administration to potentially upend Western support for Kyiv. But Poland’s PM was quick to clarify that no such plans were on the table.

Two North Korean soldiers who were captured by Ukrainian forces while fighting alongside Russian forces in Russia’s Kursk border region haven’t expressed a desire to seek asylum in South Korea, South Korea’s spy agency told lawmakers said today.

In a closed-door briefing at South Korea’s National Assembly, the National Intelligence Service confirmed its participation in the questioning of the North Korean soldiers by Ukrainian authorities. The agency said the soldiers haven’t expressed a request to resettle in South Korea, according to two lawmakers who attended the meeting.

A video released by Ukrainian government indicated that at least one of the captured soldiers expressed a desire to remain in Ukraine.

Koo Byoungsam, spokesperson of South Korea’s Unification Ministry, which handles inter-Korean affairs, said facilitating the asylum of the North Korean soldiers would require “legal reviews, including on international law, and consultations with related nations.” “There’s nothing we can say at the current stage,” Mr Koo said.

The agency said memos found on dead North Korean soldiers indicated that they had been ordered to die by suicide before being captured. The agency said one North Korean soldier, facing the threat of being captured by Ukrainian forces, shouted “General Kim Jong Un” and tried to detonate a hand grenade before he was shot and killed.

North Korean authorities reportedly called for the country’s troops to “self destruct” to evade capture, Lee Seong-kweun, a lawmaker on the South Korean parliament intelligence committee, said citing the National Intelligence Service (NIS).

“It was also found in the memos carried by those killed that North Korean authorities emphasised self-destruction and suicide before capture, and that soldiers vaguely expect to join the Workers’ Party (of North Korea) or be pardoned,” Mr Lee said.

Captured North Korean soldiers had not shown an intention to come to South Korea, though South Korea would cooperate with Ukraine if there was a request, Yonhap news agency reported also reported citing NIS.