Emergency workers sifting through the debris of a deadly overnight missile and drone attack confirmed that fragments of a North Korean missile were recovered from the wreckage in Kyiv on Monday.
“It was a Korean missile, they just found some parts,” said a firefighter at the scene around 3 pm local time, speaking on condition of anonymity as recovery operations continued.
The attack overnight Sunday-Monday targeted multiple regions of Ukraine with a combination of ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, and kamikaze drones, according to Ukrainian military officials.
Kyiv was among the hardest hit, with at least seven people killed and more than two dozen injured. Authorities warned that the casualty count could rise as rescue teams continued to search through rubble in Kyiv’s Shevchenkivskyi district where a residential building was struck about 1 kilometer (0.6 miles) from the US embassy.
The presence of North Korean missile components marks the latest confirmation of the ongoing military cooperation between Pyongyang and Moscow.
Ukrainian air defense systems intercepted many incoming threats, but some ballistic missiles got through in urban areas, causing widespread destruction to residential neighborhoods and critical infrastructure.
On June 11, Russia reportedly used North Korean ballistic missiles in another overnight onslaught that killed three people in Kharkiv, having also reportedly been used in a June 9 attack.
In April, a North Korean KN-23 (Hwasong-11A) ballistic missile also reportedly struck a residential block in Kyiv’s Sviatoshynskyi district.