Vladimir Putin with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un in eastern Russia, September 2023 (Sky)

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Wednesday’s Coverage: The Secret International Meeting to Back Kyiv’s Peace Formula

Map: Institute for the Study of War

UPDATE 1740 GMT:

Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has completed his three-nation tour of the Baltic States with a video from Latvia and thanks to Riga for military assistance.

Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas has posted photos of Zelenskiy’s stay in Tallinn earlier today with a thread hailing Ukraine’s future membership of NATO and Estonia’s pledge of 0.25% of its GDP over the next four years for military aid to Kyiv.

Russia wants to destroy the unity of the free world.

But we are stronger than Russia. The combined military, economic and political power of the free world can ensure Ukraine’s victory.

The stronger Ukraine is, the faster the breaking point arrives for Russia.

UPDATE 1325 GMT:

Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy is continuing his tour of the Baltic States with talks on Thursday in Estonia, including with Prime Minister Kaja Kallas.

Zelenskiy began the three-country trip on Wednesday in Lithuania, discussing “security, EU and NATO integration, cooperation on electronic warfare and drones, and further coordination of European support”. Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda announced a €200 million ($219 million) package of long-term military assistance to Ukraine, including M577 armored personnel carriers, ammunition, generators, and detonation systems.

UPDATE 0730 GMT:

In its latest missile strike, Russia has injured 11 civilians — four men and seven women — in a hotel in Kharkiv city in northeast Ukraine.

Nine of the victims are in hospital, and one is in critical condition. Among the wounded is a Turkish journalist.

More than 30 guests were in staying in the hotel in the city center when it was hit by an S-300 missile.

Kharkiv, in northeast Ukraine near the Russian border, has been attacked with missiles four days in a row.

Airstrikes on a coal mining operation in Donetsk in eastern Ukraine killed at least one civilian on Wednesday.

Rescuers found a man’s body under the debris of the building hit by a missile in Myrnohrad, about 50 km (31 miles) northwest of the frontline in Avdiivka.

ORIGINAL ENTRY: UN members have criticized Russia’s use of North Korean ballistic missiles in the assault on Ukraine.

The Security Council convened on Wednesday after revelations by the US, South Korea, and European countries of Moscow resorting to the North Korean munitions, delivered since last summer.

See also Ukraine War, Day 681: Russia Using North Korean Ballistic Missiles — US Officials

South Korean Ambassador Hwang Joon-Kook told the Council that North Korea has made Ukraine “a test site of its nuclear-capable missiles”.

He explained, “The introduction of North Korean missiles into the war in Ukraine has a significant implication on global nuclear non-proliferation.” The launch of the KN-23 missiles is an “existential threat” to South Korea.

Deputy US Ambassador Robert Wood noted that Russia is breaking UN arms embargoes on North Korea over Pyongyang’s nuclear weapons program:

It is abhorrent that a permanent member of the Council is flagrantly violating resolutions to attack another UN Member State.

Such violations exacerbate the suffering of the Ukrainian people and undermine the global nonproliferation regime.

Almost 50 countries published a joint statement on Tuesday condemning the North Korean transfer of the missiles and calling for an immediate end to the supply to Russia.

Moscow’s delegate denied the reports from Ukraine, insisting they were disinformation.

But Ukraine’s Sergiy Kyslytsya noted how, amid Russia’s ongoing missile and drone assaults on infrastructure and other civilian sites, Moscow can inflict harm on Ukrainians frome a safe distance “due to an ongoing supply of weapons and munitions from rogue States”.