It was allegedly a North Korean M1989 Koksan self-propelled howitzer Spotted on Russia's front lines, According to reports on Tuesday after news of the shipment of two large weapons was first announced in November.
The artillery weapon has a range of up to 37 miles when using rocket-supported shells, and is capable of firing one or two shells every five minutes.
News of the weapons, along with a video that appears to show one of the howitzers in combat position, was first reported by East 2 West News, and images of the howitzer have appeared on social media, though Fox News Digital has not been able to fully verify Independent of the location of the weapon.
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A North Korean M1989 Koksan self-propelled howitzer was spotted on Russia's front lines on January 7, 2025 after it was first spotted being transported by rail in November 2024. (Photo courtesy of East 2 West)
According to To open source intelligence published on X In November, the howitzers were geolocated and found to have been passing through Siberia by rail less than a month after the United States confirmed that North Korea had deployed up to 12,000 troops in Russia and about five months after Pyongyang and Moscow signed the agreement. A defense treaty in which they pledged military intervention. dating each other.
It is still unclear whether the video of North Korea's big gun It was taken from Russia's Kursk region, where Pyongyang's soldiers were sent to confront the Ukrainian incursion that first began in August.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un (center) supervises artillery firing exercises in North Korea on Thursday, March 7, 2024. (KCNA/Korean News Service via AP, File)
Both Ukraine and Russia reported heavy casualties in the region, with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky claiming about 3,800 North Korean soldiers were killed or wounded in an interview on Sunday.
The Ukrainian army announced on Monday that about 15,000 Russian soldiers were killed and 23,000 wounded in Kursk during the past five months.
A view of the trench built to create a defensive line around Sumy as seen in Sumy, Ukraine, on November 6, 2024. (Photo by Oksana Parafenyuk for The Washington Post via Getty Images)
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Moscow, according to A BBC report on TuesdayIt claimed that at least 49,000 Ukrainian soldiers were missing, although it did not differentiate between the number of Ukrainians wounded or killed.
Fox News Digital was unable to independently verify reports of casualties in either country.
Institute for the Study of War (ISW) He was evaluated on Monday And that Ukrainian forces achieved “tactical progress amid continuing intense offensive operations” in Kursk.
The research center added, “Ukrainian forces may continue to carry out long-range strikes against Russian rear areas in the Kursk Oblast region as part of efforts to use integrated offensive capabilities to support ground operations.”
Russian forces continued limited ground operations towards the city of Kharkiv in northern Ukraine on Sunday and Monday, but reportedly made little progress – an operation that Ukraine has been largely successful in countering since May.
Ukraine's recent offensive operations in Kursk have managed to reduce the number of Russian ground attacks in the north of the Kharkiv region, ISW reported, head of the Military Administration of the Kharkiv Region, Oleh Sinyhopov, said on Monday.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, center, meets with soldiers who participated in training in North Korea, on March 13, 2024. (KCNA/Korean News Service via AP)
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Reports on Monday indicated that Russian forces had made some progress in Donetsk and captured Kurakhov, a frontline town in the Donbass region. The seizure of this town may indicate that Russian forces are closing in on Ukrainian forces, which have been beaten for months in an effort to prevent Russian forces from encircling them. Pokrovsk cityWhich could give Russian forces a strategic win and access to supply routes linking the region to Zaporizhia.
Ukraine has not officially confirmed whether Kurakhov has fallen.
Russian forces are not believed to have made any strategic advances along other front-line areas at this time.
