Reports have emerged suggesting that North Korea has dispatched 10,000 soldiers to Russia to support its war efforts against Ukraine. This information was disclosed by a Western diplomat to the Kyiv Independent on October 15, although the specific roles and types of soldiers remain unclear.
The news comes amid growing concerns over the strengthening military alliance between Moscow and Pyongyang. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky recently warned of Russia’s plans to involve North Korea more actively in the war this fall.
The deepening ties between the two nations were further solidified earlier this year when they signed a mutual defense pact during Russian President Vladimir Putin’s visit to North Korea.
Putin has since submitted this treaty to the Russian State Duma for ratification. The agreement stipulates that each country must provide military assistance to the other in the event of an attack. Additionally, North Korea had previously announced that an engineer unit would join Russian forces in Donetsk Oblast, though no evidence has surfaced to confirm this deployment.
Western diplomats and experts view these developments as a clear indication of Russia’s increasing need for resources to sustain its war in Ukraine. John Foreman CBE, the UK’s former defense attaché in Moscow, described it as a sign of how far Russia’s military capabilities have declined over the past two and a half years.
South Korean Defense Minister Kim Yong-Hyun has also suggested that North Korea is likely to deploy regular troops to Ukraine to aid Russia at the front. However, these claims, along with reports of North Korean officers being killed in a Ukrainian missile strike in Russian-occupied territory, remain unverified.
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