SEOUL: North Korea has confirmed for the first time it had deployed troops to Russia, with state news agency KCNA on Monday reporting that Pyongyang's soldiers helped Moscow reclaim territory under Ukrainian control in the border region of Kursk.
The admission comes just days after Russia confirmed the North's participation, with South Korean and Western intelligence agencies having long reported that Pyongyang sent more than 10,000 soldiers to help in Kursk last year.
“The sub-units of our armed forces,“ the North’s Central Military Commission said in the KCNA report, had “participated in the operations for liberating the Kursk areas according to the order of the head of state of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea”.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un's decision to deploy the troops, it said, was in accordance with a mutual defense treaty between the two countries.
“They who fought for justice are all heroes and representatives of the honour of the motherland,“ Kim said according to KCNA, with the leader adding that a monument to the “battle feats” would soon be built in the capital.
According to the Central Military Commission, “the operations for liberating the Kursk area to repel the adventurous invasion of the Russian Federation by the Ukrainian authorities were victoriously concluded”.
Russian Chief of Staff Valery Gerasimov on Saturday hailed the “heroism” of the North Korean soldiers, who he said “provided significant assistance in defeating the group of Ukrainian armed forces”.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, however, said Sunday that Ukraine’s army was still fighting in Russia’s Kursk despite Moscow claiming the “liberation” of its western region.
The North’s Central Military Commission said the operation was proof of the “firm militant friendship between the two countries of the DPRK and Russia,“ using an acronym for the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.
