Seoul, South Korea:
South Korea’s spy company stated Friday it had confirmed {that a} North Korean soldier despatched to again Russia’s struggle in opposition to Ukraine had been captured by Ukrainian forces.
Pyongyang has deployed hundreds of troops to strengthen Russia’s army, together with within the Kursk border area the place Ukraine mounted a shock border incursion in August.
“Via real-time info sharing with an allied nation’s intelligence company, it has been confirmed that one injured North Korean soldier has been captured,” South Korea’s Nationwide Intelligence Service stated in an announcement.
The soldier was captured by the Ukrainian military, a South Korean intelligence supply instructed AFP, including that the situation the place he was seized was not recognized.
Friday’s affirmation got here days after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky stated that just about 3,000 North Korean troopers had been “killed or wounded” as far as they joined Russian troops in fight.
South Korea’s intelligence service had beforehand put the variety of killed or wounded North Koreans at 1,000, saying the excessive casualty charge might be right down to an unfamiliar battlefield surroundings and their lack of functionality to counter drone assaults.
Pyongyang’s troopers have been additionally being “utilised as expendable frontline assault items”, lawmaker Lee Seong-kweun stated, talking final week after a briefing by South Korea’s spy company.
‘Harmful enlargement’
North Korea and Russia have strengthened their army ties since Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
A landmark defence pact between Pyongyang and Moscow signed in June got here into pressure this month, with Russian President Vladimir Putin hailing it as a “breakthrough doc”.
North Korean state media stated Friday that Putin despatched a New 12 months’s message to North Korean chief Kim Jong Un, saying “the bilateral ties between our two nations have been elevated after our talks in June in Pyongyang”.
Ukraine’s allies have known as Pyongyang’s rising involvement in Russia’s struggle in Ukraine a “harmful enlargement” of the battle.
Seoul’s army believes that North Korea was in search of to modernise its typical warfare capabilities via fight expertise gained within the Russia-Ukraine struggle.
NATO chief Mark Rutte had additionally stated that Moscow was offering assist to Pyongyang’s missile and nuclear programmes in change for the troops.
South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Workers (JCS) stated Monday that Pyongyang is reportedly “making ready for the rotation or extra deployment of troopers” and supplying “240mm rocket launchers and 170mm self-propelled artillery” to the Russian military.
Pyongyang’s involvement in Russia’s struggle in opposition to Ukraine had prompted warnings from Seoul.
South Korea’s President Yoon Suk Yeol, at present suspended, stated in November that Seoul was “not ruling out the opportunity of offering weapons” to Ukraine, which might mark a serious shift to a long-standing coverage barring the sale of weapons to nations in lively battle.
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