Leaked Telegram messages between South Korea’s top security official and a conservative lawmaker have sparked controversy over suggestions that Seoul collaborate with Ukraine in a targeted hit on North Korean forces fighting alongside Russia.
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The incident followed President Yoon Suk-yeol’s statement on Thursday, indicating that South Korea might consider providing arms to Ukraine if military cooperation between Moscow and the North deepened.
Yoon vowed not to “sit idle” in response to Pyongyang’s troops potentially being deployed to Russia.
“We have adhered to a principle of not directly supplying lethal weapons, but we can review this more flexibly depending on North Korean military activities,” he warned.
Lawmaker Han Ki-ho, a former three-star general and a senior member of the ruling People Power Party, suggested that South Korea could help Ukrainian forces specifically target North Koreans with artillery and missile strikes.
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“If we can cooperate with Ukraine, we’d like to bomb North Korean military units to cause damage and use that damage for psychological warfare against North Korea,” Han stated in the leaked messages.