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North Korean troops have been removed from the battlefield in Russia’s Kursk region since mid-January, according to a report in South Korean media citing the country’s spy agency. The Yonhap news agency reported reported that Seoul’s National Intelligence Service (NIS) confirmed the findings of a recent New York Times report, which revealed — citing Ukrainian and U.S. intelligence — that North Korea’s troops had been withdrawn from the front line after suffering heavy losses. “Since mid-January, there have been no signs of North Korean troops deployed in Russia’s Kursk region engaging in combat,” the NIS said. The NIS told South Korean lawmakers in early January that at least 300 North Korean soldiers sent to Ukraine had been killed and some 2,700 others injured, Yonhap reported. North Korea has sent around 12,000 soldiers to join forces with Russia, which is trying to expel Ukrainian troops from Russia’s Kursk region after Kyiv’s surprise incursion last August. The North Koreans arrived in Russia in late October, and Ukraine reported their presence on the battlefield in December last year. But according to NIS analysis revealed earlier this year, the soldiers sent by Pyongyang have a “lack of understanding of modern warfare,” citing their “useless” attempts to shoot at long-range attack drones. Neither the Kremlin nor Pyongyang, which signed a partnership treaty with each other last summer, have confirmed North Korea’s participation in the war against Ukraine. On Jan. 11, however, Ukrainian forces managed to capture two North Koreans alive.

KYIV — One of the North Korean soldiers recently captured by Ukraine first tried to commit suicide, but then asked to watch Korean romance movies, said the Ukrainian paratroops who captured him. “He was already wounded in a battle, but remained relatively calm until the evacuation vehicle arrived,” one of the soldiers of the 95th assault brigade told the Ukrainian Airborne Forces’ press service in a video interview published on Tuesday. “We were escorting him to the road where there were some concrete pillars … and suddenly he ran and hit his head on the pillar.” North Korea has sent some 12,000 soldiers to join its Russian ally in trying to expel Ukrainian troops in Russia’s Kursk region after Kyiv’s surprise offensive last August. The North Koreans showed up on the battlefield in late October, and have since earned a grim reputation among Ukrainians for apparently preferring to kill themselves rather than surrender. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said North Korea has seen 4,000 dead or wounded soldiers since joining the war. On Jan. 11, Ukrainian forces managed to capture two North Koreans alive; they were taken to Kyiv, where South Korea’s spy agency has been assisting, for medical treatment and interrogation. Neither the Kremlin nor Pyongyang, which signed a limitless partnership treaty with each other last summer, have confirmed North Korea’s participation in the war against Ukraine. Kyiv has even reported Russians were instructed to burn the faces of dead North Koreans to make them difficult to identify. That makes capture of the two North Koreans of enormous propaganda value to Ukraine. During video interrogations, published by Zelenskyy, the North Korean POWs said they were told they were being deployed to Russia for training and then fighting, and that they were issued fake Russian military IDs. The Ukrainian paratroopers who captured both said they found one soldier wounded in a trench after a failed Russian assault on Ukrainian positions. “He was lying there, with his head and an arm wounded. He had a grenade, a knife and a sausage on him. I asked him to drop everything, but he refused to drop the sausage because it was food, so we let him keep it,” a Ukrainian soldier said. After the North Korean tried to kill himself by ramming his head into a pillar, the paratroops passed him on to another unit. “He calmed down. Other soldiers treated his wounds and fed him. Later, he even asked to turn on romance movies for him in Korean,” said the soldier.

KYIV — Military units from North Korea have left their Russian training grounds and entered the zone of combat between Russian and Ukraine forces for the first time, the military defense intelligence service of Ukraine (HUR) said in a Thursday evening statement. Ukrainian spies recorded the troops in Russia’s Kursk region on Wednesday, HUR said. North Korean (DPRK) soldiers are being trained at five military sites in the far east of Russia, and will have to pass a training course lasting several weeks before being deployed in the war against Ukraine, HUR said. The United States confirmed Wednesday that thousands of North Koreans are training in Russia alongside Kremlin troops. According to updated estimates from Kyiv, Pyongyang has transferred about 12,000 troops to Russia, including 500 officers and three army generals. Earlier this week Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Ukraine had already spotted North Korean army officers in the Russian-occupied territories of Ukraine’s eastern region of Donbas. Russian President Vladimir Putin has not confirmed or denied the presence of DPRK troops in his country. At the BRICS summit on Thursday, the Kremlin leader said it was “not Russia’s actions that led to the escalation,” and accused Western countries of helping Ukraine fight Moscow. Instead, he recalled that Russia’s parliament had ratified an agreement on a “comprehensive strategic partnership” with North Korea, signed by Putin in Pyongyang this summer, where both promise “mutual assistance in case of aggression” against one of the signatories. “Let’s see how this process goes,” Putin said. While the Kremlin has insisted that Russia has the right to conduct any military cooperation it wishes with North Korea, and that any military activity is not aimed “at third countries,” Pyongyang has dismissed the news that DPRK troops are primed to enter Russia’s war as groundless rumors. Ukrainian spies recorded the troops in Russia’s Kursk region on Wednesday, HUR said. | Yan Dobronosov/Getty Images Moscow has appointed Russian Deputy Defense Minister Yunus-Bek Yevkurov to monitor the training and adaptation of the DPRK troops, Ukraine’s military intelligence said. “Soldiers sent by Pyongyang are equipped with ammunition, bedding, winter clothes and shoes, as well as hygiene products. The Kremlin has high hopes for the North Korean component in the war against Ukraine and the global confrontation with the West,” HUR said. “I think they sent the officers because their officers would understand what was going on first and then send the contingent. Because, how to manage them, how to command them? I’m talking about language. I think these are serious difficulties,” Zelenskyy told reporters in Kyiv on Monday.

Kim Yo Jong, sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, lashed out at Ukraine and South Korea on Tuesday in the wake of reports that Pyongyang is sending troops to Russia, calling the two countries “bad dogs bred by the U.S.” and threatening to unleash nuclear weapons. In her statement to the Korean Central News Agency, the dictator’s sister warned that a “military provocation against a nuclear weapons state” could lead to a “horrible” and “unimaginable” situation. She scorned Seoul and Kyiv’s “reckless remarks” about states with nuclear weapons — which she repeatedly said North Korea has — describing the two nations as “lunatics” who risk “the destruction of all the scum.” “No one knows how our retaliation and revenge will be completed,” she said. The furious statement follows reports from Kyiv and Seoul that North Korea is sending its soldiers to fight alongside Russia in its war against Ukraine. Both countries said that some 10,000 troops have been deployed to Russia, with pro-Kremlin military bloggers allegedly having filmed the troops at a military base. Pyongyang and Moscow have stepped up their military cooperation since North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a comprehensive strategic partnership treaty in June. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that North Korea supports Russia because of the cash. “I think North Korea is very poor. They will send their people to the front. To be honest, we already spotted officers, technical personnel, I think, in temporarily occupied territories,” Zelenskyy told several reporters in Kyiv on Monday. “I think they sent the officers because their officers would understand what was going on first and then send the contingent. Because how to manage them, how to command them? I’m talking about language. I think these are serious difficulties,” the Ukrainian president said. South Korea’s permanent representative to the United Nations Hwang Joon-kook said that money aside, Russia could compensate North Korea for its support in the war with nuclear weapons technologies. While North Korea denied its involvement in the war by calling the reports “groundless rumors” on Tuesday, Putin’s spokesperson Dmitry Peskov did not confirm or deny the claims, and said Russia has the right to cooperate with North Korea as the cooperation is not directed at third countries. Veronika Melkozerova contributed to this report from Kyiv.

South Korea’s foreign ministry summoned the Russian ambassador to Seoul on Monday and urged an “immediate” withdrawal of North Korean soldiers from the war in Ukraine. “We condemn North Korea’s illegal military cooperation, including its dispatch of troops to Russia, in the strongest terms,” said South Korea’s First Vice Foreign Minister Kim Hong Kyun in a press release, calling for an “immediate withdrawal” of the troops. The minister warned the Russian ambassador Georgiy Zinoviev that Seoul will respond by mobilizing “all available means in cooperation with the international community to any acts that threaten the core interests of South Korea.” Zinoviev responded in a Facebook post that the cooperation with North Korea is “not directed against South Korea’s security interests” and that “it is in line with international law.” South Korea’s spy agency said Friday it believes North Korea has already begun deploying four brigades totaling 12,000 troops, including special forces, to the Kremlin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. The country’s President Yoon Suk Yeol called the involvement “a grave security threat to the world.” Pyongyang and Moscow have stepped up their military cooperation since North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a comprehensive strategic partnership treaty in June. The agreement commits both countries to provide military assistance to each other if either is attacked. The first unverified videos of North Korean soldiers at a military base in Russia were published Friday by pro-Kremlin military bloggers on Telegram. The Kremlin has previously called the footage of North Korean soldiers “fake news.” Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov on Monday said the Americans and South Koreans were providing “contradictory information” about Russia’s use of Pyongyang’s soldiers. “The DPRK is our close neighbor, our partner, and we are developing our relations in all areas, and this is our sovereign right. This should not cause any concerns for anyone, because this cooperation is not directed against third countries. We will continue to develop this cooperation,” Peskov added. NATO on Monday requested that South Korea send a delegation to brief the transatlantic military alliance on the North Korean troop deployments.

KYIV — Russia is gathering huge numbers of North Koreans to fight in Ukraine, a senior Ukrainian military intelligence official told POLITICO. “They are called the Buryat Battalion … there are some 3,000 North Koreans there,” the official said, when granted anonymity to candidly discuss the sensitive topic. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Wednesday said that Ukraine is now fighting against two states. “The coalition of criminals together with Putin currently includes North Korea — the Kim family, which enslaves more than 20 million of the Korean people. Our intelligence records not only the transfer of weapons from North Korea to Russia but also the transfer of people,” Zelenskyy said while presenting his so-called victory plan to the Ukrainian parliament. “These are workers for Russian factories — instead of Russians killed in the war. And personnel for the Russian army. This is the participation of the second state in the war against Ukraine on the side of Russia,” Zelenskyy added. The Kyiv Independent reported, citing an anonymous Western official, that Pyongyang has so far actually sent 10,000 soldiers to Russia to boost its war effort in Ukraine. Ukraine has previously said that North Korea has been supplying Russia with missiles and ammunition since the beginning of 2024, as Moscow’s forces push forward on the battlefield. In June, Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un signed a comprehensive strategic partnership treaty that commits both countries to provide military assistance to each other if either is attacked. The Kremlin, for its part, has described the reports of North Korean troops preparing to enter combat as “another fake news.”