South Korean intelligence confirms North to send 12,000 troops to fight alongside Russia in Ukraine

North Korea is to send 12,000 troops to Russia to bolster the Russian military in its war with Ukraine, South Korean news agency Yonhap reported on Friday, citing the country’s National Intelligence Service (NIS).

The NIS said that Pyongyang had decided to send four brigades comprising 12,000 soldiers in total, including special forces, which would mark North Korea’s first large-scale deployment of ground forces beyond its borders, Yonhap said.

The NIS assessment came after South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol convened an emergency security meeting with senior officials from the National Security Council, the Defence Ministry and the NIS itself amid mounting speculation that Pyongyang may be providing Russia with soldiers to fight in Ukraine, according to Yonhap.

The deployment would signal a major development in military cooperation between Moscow and Pyongyang, beyond their suspected arms deals, which have already been the subject of international criticism, Yonhap continued.

Reports of North Korean involvement in Russia’s war effort in Ukraine have become more frequent in recent weeks, with Pyongyang and Moscow deepening military cooperation since Vladimir Putin and North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un signed a mutual defence pact in June.

South Korea’s Deputy Defence Minister Kim Seon Ho told Yonhap that Pyongyang could send civilian, rather than military, personnel to Russia, adding that he would be able to say more “once more information is gathered, put together and evaluated”.

Speaking at a press conference in Brussels alongside NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte on Thursday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said that North Korea had already sent “tactical personnel and officers” to Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine, and was currently training a contingent of 10,000 troops for deployment alongside Russian forces, calling the move the “first step to a world war”.

Ukrainian news outlet The Kyiv Post reported the death of six North Korean officers in the occupied part of the Donetsk region in eastern Ukraine on 4 October, citing Ukrainian intelligence. Three more soldiers from North Korea were reportedly injured in the Ukrainian missile strike.