South Koreans watch a television broadcast reporting the North Korean Leader Kim Jong Un meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin, at the Seoul railway station on April 25, 2019 in Seoul, South Korea. (Photo by Chung Sung-Jun/Getty Images)
EDITOR’S NOTE: This report was updated 12/24/22 at 7:25 am ET to include a reported comments from Wagner’s owner and from North Korea’s foreign ministry.
ATLANTA — North Korea has supplied the Russian private military company Wagner Group with infantry rockets and missiles for use in Ukraine, the White House said today, with a spokesperson urging Pyongyang to stop it “immediately.”
“Today we can confirm that North Korea has completed an initial arms delivery to Wagner, which paid for that equipment,” National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby told reporters. “We assess that the amount of material delivered to Wagner will not change battlefield dynamics in Ukraine, but we are certainly concerned that North Korea is planning to deliver more military equipment.
“Just like the Russian government, Wagner has been forced to rely on pariah states to enable its campaign there in Ukraine,” Kirby said, referring to the Russian military’s use of Iranian drones.
Kirby said the Biden administration, through the Department of Commerce, has now designated Wagner as a “military end user,” which is meant to restrict its access to equipment “anywhere in the world based on US technology or production equipment.” Further “sanctions actions” targeting Wagner are also in the works, Kirby said.
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As detailed in a recent Breaking Defense report, Wagner is a private contracting company that US officials believe is essentially an extension of the Russian state — one that’s grown in influence in Moscow since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Led by Yevgeny Prigozhin, an ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin who’s sometimes known as “Putin’s chef,” Wagner is estimated to have some 50,000 fighters currently in Ukraine, though 40,000 of them are thought to be convicts, Kirby said today. (A video surfaced online weeks ago that purported to show Prigozhin personally recruiting Russian prisoners into his force.) The force is costing Prigozhin more than $100 million per month.
Hours after the White House’s allegation, Prigozhin dismissed the arms transfer as “gossip,” according to Reuters. “Everyone knows that North Korea has not been supplying any weapons to Russia for a long time. And no such efforts have even been made,” he reportedly said. On Friday, North Korea’s foreign ministry reportedly denied it had supplied weapons to Russia, but made no mention of Wagner.
The transfer of weapons from North Korea, which Kirby said took place over the last month, is a violation of United Nations Security Council resolutions in the White House’s view, and the US plans to raise the violations in the council.
“Of course we condemn North Korea’s actions, and we urge North Korea to cease these deliveries to Wagner immediately,” Kirby said.
RELATED: Head of US special ops in Africa likens Wagner Group to ‘terrorist organization’
During the call, Kirby repeatedly condemned Wagner’s callous use of its own troops, saying Prigozhin appears to be happy to throw the ill-prepared men “into the meat-grinder.” At least 1,000 have been killed in recent weeks, Kirby said.
But as his soldiers die, Prigozhin’s star appears to be rising in the Kremlin, enough so that there are fears of civil unrest if Wagner, the Russian military and various other armed factions come into their own conflict.
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