Armed Russian troops have been dispatched to the a key border where the country meets China and North Korea.
As political tensions between Kim Jong-un and the rest of the western world continues to ramp up, Vladimir Putin’s soldiers equipped with rifles and guard dogs were sent to a key crossing in the South East of Russia.
They were pictured patrolling the top of Zaozyornaya Hill at the Khasan crossing point on the Russian-North Korean border in the tri-border area where the boundaries of Russia, China and North Korea meet.
With the war of words between the rogue state’s dictator and US President Donald Trump prompted Putin to wade into the argument this week saying a conflict on the Korean peninsula would be ‘catastrophic’.
Russian border guards patrolling the top of Zaozyornaya Hill at the Khasan crossing point on the Russian-North Korean border
Three Russian soldiers stand on a hill near a signpost on the Russian side of the Khasan crossing
Three armed Russian troops hiking up Zaozyornaya Hill with the border clearly visible in the background
Russian soldiers in their uniform and carrying rifles look south to the direction of North Korea
The Kremlin is casting its military net far and wide with soldiers stationed all over the world on various operations.
The Russian military on Tuesday test-fired an intercontinental ballistic missile and also launched drills involving missile units in Siberia.
The Defense Ministry said a Topol ICBM was launched from the Kapustin Yar launch facility in southwestern Russia, and its practice warhead successfully hit a designated target at the Sary-Shagan firing range in Kazakhstan.
The ex-Soviet neighbors have close economic and military ties.
The ministry said the missile test was part of efforts to develop new technologies for piercing missile defenses, but gave no specifics.
A Russian soldier walks a guard dog through the heavy foliage as a comrade follows on behind
As the political tensions between Kim Jong-un and the rest of the western world continues to ramp up, Vladimir Putin’s soldiers equipped with rifles and guard dogs (pictured) were sent to a key crossing in the South East of Russia
Russian border guards patrolling the top of Zaozyornaya Hill at the Khasan crossing point on the Russian-North Korean border in the tri-border area where the boundaries of Russia, China and North Korea meet
With the war of words between the rogue state’s dictator and US President Donald Trump prompted Putin to wade into the argument this week saying a conflict on the Korean peninsula would be ‘catastrophic’
One of the soldiers walks a guard dog up a set of steps in the wooded Russian district of Primorye
In a separate development, the military also launched large-scale maneuvers in Siberia involving the Yars missile launchers along with support vehicles. It said 4,000 troops will be involved.
The Yars, the most advanced nuclear-tipped intercontinental ballistic missiles in the Russian military arsenal, is mounted on a heavy truck, making it more difficult for an enemy to spot and destroy it.
The ministry said the exercise will involve the missiles’ deployment and feature action to protect them from enemy scouts and precision strikes.
The drills come a week after Russia and Belarus wrapped up their massive weeklong war games that caused jitters in some NATO countries, including Poland and the Baltics.
The Russian military has also intensified its combat training amid tensions with NATO over Ukraine.
Russia has warned a war on the Korean peninsula would have ‘catastrophic consequences’ as China and South Korea have urged Trump and Kim to end their feud.
A guard dog leaps up at the Russian soldier
The Kremlin’s foreign ministry said it is working ‘behind the scenes’ on finding a political solution to the North Korea crisis, according to government official Mikhail Ulyanov who also said the US approach to North Korea was a dead end and the tool of sanctions against the North had almost been exhausted.
The Asian nations urged the United States to help dial down tensions with the North after Pyongyang accused President Donald Trump of declaring war yesterday.
Speaking in Beijing, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Lu Kang said war on the Korean peninsula would have no winner.
His South Korean counterpart Kang Kyung-wha accepted Kim Jong-un would inevitably ramp up the aggressive rhetoric and said: ‘It is imperative that we, Korea and the US together, manage the situation in order to prevent further escalation of tensions or any kind of accidental military clashes which can quickly go out of control.’
Yesterday, North Korea’s Foreign Minister Ri Yong-ho made the shock claim that Trump had declared war on North Korea, a statement branded ‘absurd’ by the White House.
After the White House took the unusual step of denying it had opened the door to conflict with the nuclear-armed Asian nation, Defence Secretary Jim Mattis said Washington’s goal was ‘to solve this diplomatically’.
‘We maintain the capability to deter North Korea’s most dangerous threats but also to back up our diplomats in a manner that keeps this as long as possible in the diplomatic realm,’ he said in New Delhi after talks with his Indian counterpart.
Speaking today, Lu said: ‘We hope the US and North Korean politicians have sufficient political judgment to realise that resorting to military force will never be a viable way to resolve the peninsula issue and their own concerns.
‘We also hope that both sides can realise that being bent on assertiveness and provoking each other will only increase the risk of conflict and reduce room for policy manoeuvres. War on the peninsula will have no winner.’
A stone in memory of the 1938 Battle of Lake Khasan, a Soviet-Japanese border conflict, on the top of Zaozyornaya Hill at the Khasan crossing point on the Russian-North Korean border
Armed Russian troops have been dispatched to the a key border where the country meets China and North Korea
While repeatedly calling for dialogue to resolve the issue, China has also signed up for increasingly tough UN sanctions against North Korea.
China’s fuel exports to North Korea fell in August, along with iron ore imports from the isolated nation, as trade slowed after the latest UN sanctions, but coal shipments resumed after a five-month hiatus, customs data showed on Tuesday.
In Moscow, Russia’s Foreign Ministry said it was working behind the scenes to find a political solution and that using sanctions against North Korea was almost exhausted.
U.S. Defense Secretary James Mattis, speaking during a visit to India, said he appreciated global efforts to increase pressure on North Korea for its dangerous behaviour.