Ukraine-Russia newest: Trump ‘to call Putin’ as Biden plans last surge in navy assist to Kyiv

The Kremlin has responded cautiously following Donald Trump’s victory in the US presidential election.

Officials suggested that while Trump’s rhetoric on ending the Ukraine war was noteworthy, it remains to be seen if it will translate into tangible policy changes.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov made clear that, despite Trump’s campaign promises to bring an end to the war in Ukraine, Russia viewed the US as an “unfriendly” state that remained deeply involved in the conflict.

“Let us not forget that we are talking about an unfriendly country, which is both directly and indirectly involved in a war against our state,” Mr Peskov told reporters, adding that Moscow would wait to see if Trump’s statements on Ukraine would result in concrete actions.

Despite the continued animosity, Russian state media during the election campaign showed a clear preference for Trump, suggesting some hope in Moscow that his administration could be more amenable to dialogue than the current one.

Kirill Dmitriev, the head of Russia’s sovereign wealth fund and a former Goldman Sachs banker with prior contacts to Trump’s team, said that a Trump presidency could offer a “new opportunity” for a reset in US-Russia relations.

President Volodymyr Zelensky said the first battles between the Ukrainian military and North Korean troops “open a new page in instability in the world” after his defence minister said a “small engagement” had taken place.

Mr Zelensky, in his nightly video address, thanked those in the world who, he said, had reacted to the dispatch of North Korean troops to Russia last month “not just with words … but who are preparing actions to support our defence”.

“The first battles with North Korean soldiers open a new page of instability in the world,” he said.

He said that Ukraine, acting with the rest of the world, had to “do everything so that this Russian step to expand the war with real escalation fails.”

Ukrainian defence minister Rustem Umerov confirmed in an interview with South Korean television that the first engagement had occurred with North Korean troops, an escalation in a conflict that began when Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022.

Nato secretary general Mark Rutte has called North Korea’s troops fighting in Europe a “turning point”, warning the world of a “deeply dangerous” moment.

“This dangerous expansion of the conflict escalates the war and demonstrates that our security is not regional, it is global,” he wrote for Politico.

“These deepening military and economic ties between a reckless Russia and an emboldened North Korea don’t just threaten Euro-Atlantic and Indo-Pacific security, they are deeply dangerous for global security,” the Nato chief said.

Calling the Russian invasion ill-judged, Mr Rutte said: “On every front, Putin is failing to achieve his strategic objectives through this illegal and ill-judged war of aggression. While we seek a just and lasting end to the conflict, he’s only prolonging and expanding it.

“President Vladimir Putin’s litany of failures since starting this senseless war has only made Russia more reliant on its authoritarian friends in Asia: China, Iran and North Korea,” he said.

The training period before North Korean soldiers join the fight in Vladimir Putin’s invasion has been cut short, Kyiv says.

North Korean troops were expected to undergo a month’s training, Ukrainian defence minister Rustem Umerov said, but that “is now being shortened to… two weeks or one week so that they could get engagement in the battlefield”.

North Korean personnel will finish deploying within a few weeks once they complete training in the Russian Far East, experts have said.

A total of 15,000 troops could be deployed along northeastern, eastern and southeastern parts of the 1,000km (600-mile) frontline in Ukraine, according to Mr Umerov.

Russia has declined to acknowledge that North Korean troops are operating in its territory, but Putin last week did not deny reports of their presence. He said it was up to Russia how to implement its defence pact with Pyongyang.

The White House plans to rush billions of dollars in security assistance to Ukraine before president Joe Biden leaves office in January, sources said yesterday, hoping to shore up the government in Kyiv before president-elect Donald Trump’s 20 January inauguration.

The Biden administration aims to send at least $9bn in military aid to Ukraine.

“The administration plans to push forward… to put Ukraine in the strongest position possible” a senior administration official said on condition of anonymity, before its term ends in January.

Mr Trump has been critical of Biden’s assistance for Ukraine, fueling concern about the future of support for president Volodymyr Zelensky’s government under a Republican-controlled White House, Senate and possibly the House of Representatives.

South Korean president Yoon Suk Yeol held a telephone call with US president-elect Donald Trump and discussed continuing close ties across all areas in security and economic fields, a senior South Korean official said today.

Both the leaders shared concerns over North Korea’s deployment of troops backing Russia in the war against Ukraine and Pyongyang’s continued military provocations including ballistic missile launches, the official told reporters.

“They shared the view they need to discuss these issues in person and agreed to meet at an early time once they are able to set a date and location,” Yoon’s deputy national security adviser, Kim Tae-hyo, said.

Mr Yoon congratulated Mr Trump on winning the presidency on the “Make America Great Again” slogan and said the success of the three-way cooperation between South Korea, Japan and the United States was due in part to the foundation laid by Trump’s first presidency, Mr Kim said.

Ukrainian forces have engaged in “small-scale” clashes with North Korean troops in Kursk, Ukraine’s defence minister Rustem Umerov said.

“Yes, I think so. It is (an) engagement,” Mr Umerov told South Korea’s KBS television in an interview broadcast yesterday, when asked if a clash had occurred.

The report quoted Mr Umerov as saying that the engagement was small for now, but more are expected as the number of North Koreans deployed grows.

“(There are) already contacts, but after a couple of weeks, we would see a more significant number and upon this, we will review it and analyse it,” he said.

Mr Umerov said the Russian military was trying to pass off the North Korean soldiers as Buryats, a Mongolian ethnic group from Siberia, making their identification more challenging for Kyiv.

Russian drones struck a district of Kyiv just outside the city centre early today, with authorities reporting damage to an apartment and garages being set ablaze, but no injuries.

Air defences were in operation after midnight in the Ukrainian capital.

Serhiy Popko, head of Kyiv’s military administration, said an apartment had been badly damaged and garages had been set on fire in the Holosiivskyi district.

Mayor Vitali Klitschko said falling drone fragments had triggered the fires. Emergency crews were on their way to the scene.

Air raid alerts remained in effect in Kyiv and through most of central and southern Ukraine for more than an hour.

Putin’s forces are believed to be losing hundreds of troops a day, with Ukrainian estimates going as high as 1,200 to 1,500, so the more than 10,000 troops South Korea believes are in Russia would last two weeks or so at that rate.

“In the big picture, even 12,000 soldiers don’t affect the general situation of the war significantly,” says Emil Kastehelmi, who runs the Black Bird Group, which tracks the war in Ukraine.