The U.S. government has confirmed for the first time that North Korean soldiers have died while fighting for Russia in Ukraine.
During a press briefing on December 16, U.S. Department of State spokesperson Matthew Miller stated, “We have seen North Korean soldiers who have been killed in action on the battlefield inside Russia.”
He added, “If they were to cross the border into Ukraine, that would be yet another escalation by the Government of Russia and also an escalation by the government of North Korea to send North Korean troops to prosecute a war of aggression against an independent, sovereign nation inside that nation’s borders.”
Reports from both Ukrainian and Russian sources indicate that clashes between North Korean troops deployed to support Russia’s military and Ukrainian forces have intensified on the battlefield.
According to Ukraine’s Defense Intelligence Agency (DIU), on December 14, mixed combat units composed of North Korean and Russian paratroopers and marines suffered “critical and irreparable losses” due to Ukrainian attacks. The DIU estimated that as many as 200 soldiers from these units had died.
In a follow-up message on Telegram, the DIU claimed that at least 30 North Korean soldiers were either killed or wounded in the fighting. The areas where casualties occurred include Plekhovo, Vorozhba, and the village of Martinivka in Kursk. Additionally, three North Korean soldiers were reported missing in the village of Kurilovka, also located in the Kursk region.
Despite these reported losses, DIU stated that the mixed Russian-North Korean units have been replenished with new personnel and continue to actively engage in combat operations against Ukrainian forces.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky also confirmed that a “considerable number” of North Korean soldiers had been mobilized in the Kursk region, although he did not provide specific figures.
The U.S.-based think tank Institute for the Study of War (ISW) echoed DIU’s claims in its latest report, noting that they align with prior reports suggesting North Korean troops are being used as infantry in Russia’s ongoing war of attrition.
The claim that North Korean soldiers are actively participating in combat in Kursk is also being reported from within Russia. On December 13, several Russian military bloggers published posts claiming that North Korean soldiers had achieved significant combat success.
These pro-Kremlin outlets, which play a key role in Russian wartime propaganda, asserted that North Korean troops had successfully recaptured a village in Kursk. The reports stated that North Korean soldiers advanced through a 2-kilometer minefield in just two hours, killing approximately 300 Ukrainian soldiers. However, these bloggers acknowledged that some North Korean soldiers also sustained casualties in the process.
Kursk, which was briefly seized by Ukrainian forces in a surprise operation in August, has remained a contested area. More than 11,000 North Korean soldiers are reportedly stationed there.
Tensions within Russian-North Korean units have reportedly emerged due to language barriers. The DIU disclosed that North Korean soldiers mistakenly fired upon a vehicle belonging to Russia’s elite Akhmat special forces unit, killing eight Chechen soldiers. The Akhmat unit, known for its ferocity and brutality, operates under the command of Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov.
“The language barrier remains a significant challenge for the operational control of North Korean troops on the front lines,” the DIU stated.
The ISW also highlighted this issue, noting that communication difficulties between Russian and North Korean forces are hampering battlefield coordination. The ISW warned that this lack of integration could lead to friction within the joint Russian-North Korean units and weaken Russia’s military operations in Kursk in the short term.
Ukraine’s 414th Attack Drone Regiment recently shared footage on Telegram allegedly showing the bodies of North Korean soldiers killed in combat on the Kursk front. The video and images depict several corpses, but the poor video quality has made it difficult to verify the authenticity of the claim that the bodies belong to North Korean soldiers.
BY YOUNGNAM KIM [kim.youngnam@koreadaily.com]
