September 6, 2023
UK to ban Russia’s Wagner Group as terrorist organization: reports
Britain is set to ban the Russian mercenary Wagner Group as a terrorist organization, according to media reports.
“Wagner is a violent and destructive organization which has acted as a military tool of Vladimir Putin’s Russia overseas,” the Daily Mail newspaper quoted Home Secretary Suella Braverman as saying.
Draft measures to ban Wagner under the Terrorism Act will be put forward in Parliament on Wednesday, the reports said.
The measures would make it a criminal offense to support or be a member of the group. The law would also allow Wagner’s assets to be categorized as terrorist property and confiscated.
“Wagner has been involved in looting, torture and barbarous murders,” Braverman said.
She added that its work in Ukraine and Africa was a “threat to global security.”
“That is why we are proscribing this terrorist organization and continuing to aid Ukraine wherever we can in its fight against Russia.”
https://p.dw.com/p/4VzcX
September 6, 2023
Supplying weapons to Russia will have consequences, US warns North Korea
North Korea will “pay a price” if it supplies Russia with weaponry for its war on Ukraine, the White House said.
Jake Sullivan, the national security adviser, told reporters that Pyongyang and Moscow were eyeing “leader-level discussions, perhaps even in person.”
The meeting between Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un would be to discuss possible deals for weapons transfer.
Moscow could use additional supplies to “try to conquer territory that belongs to another sovereign nation.”
“This is not going to reflect well on North Korea and they will pay a price for this in the international community,” Sullivan added.
The Kremlin said on Tuesday that it was unable to confirm the reports of the potential meeting, with spokesman Dmitry Peskov saying: “We have nothing to say on this.”
A meeting with Putin would be Kim’s first summit with a foreign leader since North Korea closed its borders in January 2020.
They met for the first time in April 2019, two months after Kim’s high-stakes nuclear diplomacy with former US President Donald Trump collapsed.
https://p.dw.com/p/4VzaY
September 6, 2023
Putin ‘desperate’ if he’s turning to Pyongyang, says German lawmaker
German lawmaker Falko Drossmann has told DW that he is concerned about reports of a meeting between the leaders of Russia and North Korea because it shows Moscow is “desperate” to acquire new weaponry.
“How desperate Vladimir Putin is, that the last state he can cooperate with…is North Korea,” said Drossman, who is from the center-left Social Democrats.
He also said it was clear sanctions were hurting Russia and the country now had a problem.
“They [Russia] don’t have new weapons. They don’t have modern technology. So they have to use very old-fashioned USSR weaponry, especially artillery, and that’s actually the ammunition North Korea can provide because they still use the same weaponry.”
On whether he was concerned about warming ties between the two countries, particularly given North Korea’s nuclear ambitions, Drossmann said a more significant concern was “Russia starting a war in the center of Europe and killing thousands.”
rm/nm (Reuters, AP, AFP, dpa)
https://p.dw.com/p/4Vzah