Not more than twenty cars had been seen on the railway property in the past five years.
Seoul:
Train traffic between North Korea and Russia has increased dramatically following a recent summit between Kim Jong Un and Vladimir Putin, indicating a “likely” arms transfer, according to a new report from Washington-based analysts Beyond Parallel.
High-resolution satellite images reveal at least 70 freight cars at North Korea’s Tumangang Rail Facility borderline, the group said Friday, a number described as “unprecedented” even compared to pre-Covid-19 levels.
According to the report, no more than 20 cars had been seen on the railway property in the past five years.
The flurry of activity “likely points to the supply of weapons and ammunition from North Korea to Russia,” the report concludes, while adding that tarpaulins covering the shipping containers made it impossible to “definitively identify” their contents.
The analysis comes a day after CBS News quoted an unnamed U.S. official as saying North Korea had begun transferring artillery to Russia for use in the war in Ukraine.
Putin and Kim’s face-to-face meeting last month sparked widespread concern among Kiev’s allies about the possibility of a possible arms deal.
North Korea, which the US has previously accused of supplying grenades to Russia’s Wagner Group, is a mass producer of conventional weapons and is known to have large stockpiles of Soviet-era war materials – albeit in unknown condition.
Russia has increased production of grenades this year to an expected 2.5 million, but analysts have suggested this could not meet battlefield needs. According to Ukrainian figures, Moscow’s armed forces fire around 60,000 bullets per day.
While Russia said no agreements were signed during Kim’s visit, Putin said he saw “opportunities” for military cooperation.
Russia and North Korea, historic allies, are both subject to a range of global sanctions: Moscow for invading Ukraine, and Pyongyang for testing nuclear weapons.
The White House has said that any arms exports from North Korea to Russia would “directly violate multiple U.N. Security Council resolutions, including resolutions that Russia itself has adopted.”
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