Russia is breaking UN rules by accepting arms from North Korea to use in its “illegal, unprovoked and unjustified” war on Ukraine, the EU’s External Action Service (EEAS) said Friday.
In a statement slamming Moscow for continued military cooperation with Pyongyang — as reported by POLITICO — the bloc’s foreign affairs wing said it “strongly condemns any such arms transfers,” adding that Russia was “violating its own co-authored UN Security Council resolutions.”
The UN resolutions are targeted at limiting military cooperation with North Korea over its nuclear weapons program, but in September the country’s secretive leader Kim Jong Un met Russia’s President Vladimir Putin in Russia’s Far East for talks.
Since then, the two sides have apparently ramped up military cooperation. On Wednesday, South Korea’s National Intelligence Service briefed lawmakers at a closed-door parliamentary session that North Korea had made at least 10 arms transfers to Russia since August, delivering a million rounds of artillery.
In return, North Korea was receiving help developing satellite technology, according to reports.
The arms deliveries could help Moscow gain the upper hand in its war against Ukraine and come as EU countries fall behind in their own pledge to deliver a million rounds to Kyiv by the end of next March.
“The EU strongly condemns any such arms transfers,” the EEAS said in its statement. “The EU urges the DPRK and Russia to refrain from any exchanges of military equipment or ammunition and abide by the successive UN Security Council resolutions.”
