Ukraine believes North Korean soldiers fighting alongside Russia’s army on the Kursk front line have been “withdrawn” after suffering heavy losses, a military spokesman told AFP on Friday.
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Western, South Korean and Ukrainian intelligence agencies say Pyongyang deployed more than 10,000 troops to support Russia’s forces fighting in its western Kursk region, where Ukraine launched a shock cross-border offensive in August.
Kyiv captured dozens of border settlements in the operation – the first time a foreign army had crossed into Russian territory since the Second World War – in an embarrassing setback for the Kremlin.
The North Korean deployment – never officially confirmed by Moscow or Pyongyang – was supposed to reinforce Russia’s army and help them expel Ukraine’s troops.
But nearly six months on, Ukraine still holds on to swathes of Russian territory, something President Volodymyr Zelensky sees as a key bargaining chip in any future negotiations with Moscow.
“Over the past three weeks, we have not seen or detected any activity or military clashes with the North Koreans,” Oleksandr Kindratenko, spokesman for the Special Operations Forces, told AFP.