Ukraine war latest: North Korean soldiers 'brought in again' to fight in Kursk Oblast, Zelensky says
Key developments on Feb. 7:
North Korean soldiers "brought in again" to fight in Kursk Oblast, Zelensky says
Ukraine downs Russian guided bomb near Zaporizhzhia, Air Force says
Kyiv denies reports of alleged failed Russian Oreshnik missile launch at Ukraine
Trump ready to step up Russia sanctions to end war in Ukraine, special envoy says
North Korean soldiers were "brought in again" by Russia to the embattled Kursk Oblast, President Volodymyr Zelensky said in his evening address on Feb. 7.
Commander-in-Chief Oleksandr Syrskyi briefed Zelensky about new Russian attacks in Kursk Oblast, a day after Russian media claimed Ukraine had launched a new offensive in the Russian region.
"A significant number of occupiers have been eliminated, we are talking hundreds of Russian and North Korean servicemen," the president said.
The Kyiv Independent could not verify these claims.
The New York Times reported on Jan. 30 that North Korean troops had been pulled from the front, and a Special Operations Forces spokesperson confirmed to the Kyiv Independent that Ukraine's special forces had not faced Pyongyang's soldiers for three weeks.
Ukraine's spy chief Kyrylo Budanov denied these reports. He said that the number of North Korean troops has decreased, and Ukraine is trying to establish why.
"A total of 60,000 Russian troops in Kursk Oblast are 60,000 that have not replenished the already significant occupier's forces in Pokrovsk and other sectors in our Donetsk Oblast," Zelensky said.
Ukrainian forces shot down a Russian guided aerial bomb near the front-line southern city of Zaporizhzhia on Feb. 7, Air Force spokesperson Yurii Ihnat told Interfax-Ukraine.
Guided aerial bombs (KABs), while having a shorter range than missiles, are cheaper to produce and are launched from aircraft within Russian territory or Russian-occupied territories, beyond the reach of Ukrainian air defense.
They are nearly impossible to shoot down because they have heavy iron structures, and come in extremely fast from high altitudes, unlike cruise missiles or drones, according to experts.
According to Ihnat, it was not the first time Ukraine downed a guided bomb.
"To counter this threat, we need a comprehensive approach — both the use of ground-based air defense and aviation components to drive the carriers of these KABs as far as possible," the spokesperson said, without specifying how the target was shot down.
His remarks came after Telegram channels reported that Ukrainian soldiers had down the guided aerial bomb on the morning of Feb. 7, allegedly using experimental weaponry.
Read also: Trump's ICC sanctions won't hinder Russian war crimes investigation, Kyiv says
Ukraine's Center for Strategic Communication and Information Security on Feb. 7 refuted media reports of Russia's alleged failed launch of its new intermediate-range ballistic missile, the Oreshnik, at Ukraine.
The statement came after Forbes, citing Ukrainian soldier and blogger Kyrylo Sazonov, wrote that Russia launched another Oreshnik missile on Feb. 6 "apparently targeting Kyiv." Sazonov claimed that the missile "didn't fly far" and exploded in Russia.
"The article in the U.S. media is based only on Sazonov's assumptions, not on actual data," the statement, published by the center that operates under Ukraine's Culture and Information Ministry, read.
Neither Ukraine nor Russia has officially reported the launch of Oreshnik.
Read also: Ukraine expecting important decisions at Ramstein meeting, Foreign Ministry says
U.S. President Donald Trump is prepared to double down on the sanctions against Russia to pressure the Kremlin into ending its war against Ukraine, Keith Kellogg, the U.S. special envoy for Ukraine and Russia, told The New York Post in an interview published on Feb. 6.
According to Kellogg, current U.S. sanctions on Russia, particularly those targeting its energy sector, amount to a "3 on a 10-point scale" regarding economic pressure. He argued there is significant room to strengthen them further.
"You could really increase the sanctions — especially the latest sanctions (targeting oil production and exports)," Kellogg said. "It's opened the aperture way high to do something."
He added that Trump has already gathered his national security team, including Vice President J.D. Vance and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, to discuss a coordinated strategy to end the war.
Kellogg criticized former President Joe Biden's approach of supporting Ukraine "as long as it takes," calling it "a bumper sticker, not a strategy."
Kellogg emphasized that Trump's administration is focused on a "holistic approach" to ending the war, combining support for Ukraine with increased pressure on Russia.
Trump's special envoy is expected to visit Ukraine later this month for talks with Ukrainian officials, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky's Chief of Staff Andriy Yermak said on Feb. 7.
Read also: Zelensky, Trump may meet in Washington next week
Ukraine War Latest is put together by the Kyiv Independent news desk team, who keep you informed 24 hours a day, seven days a week. If you value our work and want to ensure we have the resources to continue, join the Kyiv Independent community.
We've been working hard to bring you independent, locally-sourced news from Ukraine. Consider supporting the Kyiv Independent.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
CNN
30 minutes ago
- CNN
Putin promised to make Ukraine pay for its airbase attacks. What does he have left?
The operation, codenamed 'Spiderweb,' was 18 months in the making. Dozens of hidden drones emerged from trucks parked in Russia, racing to airfields thousands of miles from Ukraine and destroying at least 12 bombers. Although the operation was a huge boost for Ukrainian morale, many in the country braced for Moscow's retaliation. Their fears sharpened when Russian President Vladimir Putin told his US counterpart Donald Trump on Wednesday that the Kremlin would 'have to respond' to the attack. Russia's initial retaliation began Thursday night, in the form of a massive drone and missile strike on Kyiv and across the country. Russia's Ministry of Defense described the strikes as a 'response' to Kyiv's 'terrorist acts.' The attack was punishing, but not qualitatively different to what Ukraine has grown used to over three years of war. Olha, a 67-year-old resident of Kyiv who asked to be identified only by her first name, told CNN that if Thursday night's strikes were Russia's retaliation, then Ukraine faces 'many such retaliations – once a month, even more.' Russia's response so far to Ukraine's extraordinary operation has raised questions about Putin's ability to escalate the war and exact the retribution that many of his supporters have clamored for. And it has left Ukrainians wondering if it has already felt the brunt of Russia's response, or if the worst is yet to come. In determining Russia's retaliation, analysts say, Putin has faced several constraints. One is political: Mounting a large-scale, innovative response to the 'Spiderweb' operation would be akin to admitting that Ukraine had inflicted a serious blow against Russia – an impression the Kremlin has been at pains to avoid, said Kateryna Stepanenko, a Russia analyst at the Institute for the Study of War, a think tank in Washington DC. In a meeting with government ministers on Wednesday, Putin received a lengthy briefing on recent bridge collapses in Kursk and Bryansk, blamed by Russia on Ukraine. Yet, aside from Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov's reference to recent 'criminal provocations' by Kyiv, there was no mention of the 'Spiderweb' operation. In Russian state media's coverage of Putin's call Wednesday with Trump, little was made of the Russian president's pledge to 'respond' to Ukraine's attack. Instead, the reports focused on the outcome of recent peace talks in Istanbul. Stepanenko said this is part of a deliberate strategy. 'Putin is trying to make this go away and hide this failure yet again,' she told CNN. She said a high-profile response 'would contradict the Kremlin's strategic objective of making it all go away and sweeping this under the rug.' Putin has also faced material constraints. Whereas Russia's near-daily strikes on Ukraine used to involve just dozens of drones, they now routinely use more than 400. A day before Ukraine's 'Spiderweb' operation, on May 31, Russia launched 472 drones at Ukraine – a record in the three-year war, which was surpassed again during Sunday night's attacks, which used 479 drones. 'Russia's response is constrained by the amount of force they're constantly using,' said William Alberque, a former NATO arms control official now at the Stimson Center think tank. 'How would you know if Russia was actually retaliating? What would be more brutal than them destroying apartment flats or attacking shopping malls? What would escalation look like?' Russia's pro-war community of Telegram bloggers was not short of ideas. Some prominent channels said that Kyiv's strikes on Moscow's nuclear-capable bombers warranted a nuclear strike on Ukraine. Others called for a strike using the Oreshnik ballistic missile, which was unveiled by Putin last year, and has so far been used only once against Ukraine. Although Putin often praises his new missile, it has limited uses, said Mark Galeotti, a leading Russia analyst. 'The Oreshnik is really geared for a particular kind of target. It's not that accurate… and it's not a bunker-buster,' he told CNN, meaning the missile would struggle to take out key manufacturing and decision-making hubs that Ukraine has moved deep underground. 'If you're going to deploy it… you want it to have a target that's worthy of the name.' One target could be Ukraine's security services, the SBU, which masterminded the 'Spiderweb' operation, he said. 'But that's not something you can do quickly,' he cautioned. 'In some ways, Putin has already swept away most of the escalation rungs at his disposal, which means that he doesn't have the option for clear punishment.' In a sign that Moscow's 'retaliation' may be ongoing, Russia's Ministry of Defense said it had struck a Ukrainian airfield in the western Rivne region on Sunday night – a week after Ukraine's attacks on Russian airfields. The ministry said the attack was 'one of the retaliatory strikes' for Kyiv's 'terrorist attacks' against Russia's airfields, suggesting there may be more to come. Yuriy Ihnat, a spokesperson for Ukraine's air force, said the attack on the airfield was 'one of the biggest ever carried out by Russia.' Although air defenses 'performed very well,' he said it was 'impossible to shoot down everything.' Although Putin may be constrained in his ability to respond to Ukraine's spectacular operation with one of Russia's own, this may not matter on the battlefield, said Galeotti. 'From a political perspective… it's the Ukrainians who demonstrate that they are the nimble, imaginative, effective ones, and the Russians are just thuggish brutes who continue to grind along,' he said. 'But from the military perspective, in some ways, that's fine.' While Ukraine may have the initiative in terms of headlines and spectacle, Russia still has the initiative on the battlefield. Russian troops have opened a new front in Ukraine's northern Sumy region and are now just 12 miles from the main city. And on Sunday, Moscow claimed that its forces had advanced into the central Ukrainian region of Dnipropetrovsk for the first time, after months of clashes. The question is whether 'Putin is willing to accept whatever damage happens on the home front, precisely for his slow attrition grind forward,' said Galeotti. Alberque, of the Stimson Center, said a lot rests on whether Ukraine has been weaving more 'Spiderwebs,' or whether its drone attack was a one-off. 'The fact that this operation was a year- and-a-half in the planning – how many other operations are a year-in right now?' he asked. Two days after the drone attack, Ukraine's SBU unveiled another operation – its third attempt to blow up the bridge connecting Russia and the occupied Crimean Peninsula. The bridge over the Kerch Strait was not significantly damaged, but the attack reinforced the SBU's commitment to impressing upon Moscow that there are costs to continuing its war. If 'humiliating' operations like those continue, Putin will come under greater pressure to deliver a response that is different in kind, not just degree, Alberque said. 'Putin is such a creature of strongman politics,' he added. '(The Kremlin) is going to look for other ways to strike back, to show the Russian people that Putin is a great wartime president who is inflicting horrible damage on his enemy, rather than a victim of these spectacular Ukrainian attacks.' CNN's Kosta Gak and Victoria Butenko contributed reporting.
Associated Press
31 minutes ago
- Associated Press
Canada plans to hit NATO spending target early and reduce US defense reliance, Carney says
TORONTO (AP) — Canada will meet NATO's military spending guideline by early next year and diversify defense spending away from the United States, Prime Minister Mark Carney said Monday. Carney said Canada will achieve NATO's spending target of 2% of gross domestic product five years earlier than it had previously planned. 'Our military infrastructure and equipment have aged, hindering our military preparedness,' Carney said. 'Only one of our four submarines is seaworthy. Less than half of our maritime fleet and land vehicles are operational. More broadly we are too reliant on the United States.' According to NATO figures, Canada was estimated to be spending 1.33% of GDP on its military budget in 2023, below the 2% target that NATO countries have set for themselves. Canada previously said it was on track to meet NATO's spending target by the end of the decade. 'Our goal is to protect Canadians, not to satisfy NATO accountants,' Carney said. The announcement of increased spending came as Canada is about to host a summit of the Group of Seven leading industrialized nations in Alberta on June 15-17, and before the NATO summit in Europe. It also comes as NATO allies are poised to increase the commitment well beyond the 2% target. NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte said last week that most U.S. allies at NATO endorse U.S. President Donald Trump's demand that they invest 5% of gross domestic product on their defense needs and are ready to ramp up security spending even more. Carney has said that he intends to diversify Canada's procurement and enhance the country's relationship with the EU. 'We should no longer send three quarters of our defense capital spending to America,' Carney said in a speech at the University of Toronto. 'We will invest in new submarines, aircraft, ships, armed vehicles and artillery, as well as new radar, drones and sensors to monitor the seafloor and the Arctic.' Canada has been in discussions with the European Union to join an EU drive to break its security dependency on the United States , with a focus on buying more defense equipment, including fighter jets, in Europe. Carney's government is reviewing the purchase of U.S. F-35 fighter jets to see if there are other options. Carney said that the U.S. 'is beginning to monetize its hegemony: charging for access to its markets and reducing its (relative) contributions to our collective security.' 'Middle powers compete for interests and attention, knowing that if they are not at the table, they will be on the menu,' Carney said. Trump's calls to make Canada the 51st U.S. state have infuriated Canadians, and Carney won the job of prime minister after promising to confront the increased aggression shown by Trump. Carney said that the long-held view that Canada's geographic location will protect Canadians is becoming increasingly archaic. European allies and Canada have already been investing heavily in their armed forces, as well as on weapons and ammunition, since Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24, 2022.
Yahoo
34 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Musk predicts Trump's tariffs will cause recession amid growing spat with president
Former presidential adviser and confidante Elon Musk escalated his growing feud with President Trump by saying the president's tariffs would result in a recession later this year. 'The Trump Tariffs will cause a recession in the second half of this year,' he wrote on his social media website, X. The remark is the latest dig at Trump's policies since the tech billionaire left his role in the administration last week as head of the government cost-cutting panel known as the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE. Musk blasted Republicans' tax-and-spending-cut bill this week, which Trump helped to shepherd through the House last month, calling it a 'disgusting abomination.' 'I'm sorry, but I just can't stand it anymore,' Musk wrote on X on Tuesday. 'This massive, outrageous, pork-filled Congressional spending bill is a disgusting abomination. Shame on those who voted for it: you know you did wrong. You know it.' Beyond the president's policies, Musk also attacked Trump personally, claiming Thursday that Trump is mentioned in files pertaining to Jeffrey Epstein, the convicted child abuser who died in jail in 2019. 'Time to drop the really big bomb: [Donald Trump] is in the Epstein files. That is the real reason they have not been made public. Have a nice day, DJT!' he wrote on X. Musk's efforts with DOGE during his time in the Trump administration stirred a flurry of controversy and led to resignations of top officials in multiple agencies, including the IRS and the Treasury Department. Concerns about his team's access to private data have resulted in lawsuits. 'DOGE's mission to advise OMB and the White House on how to slash regulations and cut expenditures puts at risk important consumer safeguards and public protections,' Robert Weissman, co-president of Public Citizen, an advocacy group that brought a lawsuit against the administration, said in a January statement. Controversies have also been swirling about Musk's personal life. A recent New York Times investigation found that Musk was 'juggling … a drug habit far more serious than previously known.' Musk's criticism is channeling concerns among economists and business leaders about the prospect of a recession resulting from tariffs. Trump's tariffs — notably his 'reciprocal,' country-specific tariffs and triple-digit tariffs on China — have been walked back, but a highly elevated overall U.S. tariff rate relative to recent decades has remained in place. The overall tariff rate is somewhere between 10 and 15 percent now, according to various estimates, and Trump's tariffs are expected to pull in about $2.5 trillion in federal revenues. The Federal Reserve has repeatedly painted a stagflationary picture of the economic outlook in recent months. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) factored a boosted inflationary prediction of 0.4 percentage points as a result of the tariffs into its budgetary calculations this week. However, a recession is far from guaranteed, and many predictions about the economy have grown more positive as trade negotiations have continued. The U.S. trade deficit narrowed by a record amount in April following intense front-running of tariffs by importers in the first quarter, causing a collective sigh of relief from many investors. 'The drop in imports should have a positive impact on GDP, quelling any fears of a recession in the near term,' Damian McIntyre, vice president at investment firm Federated Hermes, commented Thursday. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
