North Korea provides human and logistical support to Russia in its war in Ukraine. Aid that demonstrates the current global recomposition.
It was not until April 26, 2025 and a conversation between Vladimir Putin and Valeri Guerassimov, head of the Russian staff, that the role of the North Korean troops in the conflict between Russia to Ukraine is finally recognized by Moscow[1]. By thanking Pyongyang’s men for their assistance, the general thus formalized a reality that no one was aware of the many alerts launched by Ukraine and South Korea for several months.
The official recognition of this military support which intensifies is not an isolated phenomenon, but the illustration of the growing rapprochement between the two powers. Pyongyang and Moscow, United by a common anti-Western vision and a certain appetite for geopolitical revisionism, intend to perpetuate this collaboration and extend it beyond the military area alone.
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As Vladimir Putin indicated on April 28: ” We are confident in the fact that these relationships of friendship, good neighborhood and cooperation between our countries, forged on the battlefield, will continue to develop ».
Military support that intensifies
The beginnings of this military support appeared a few months after the triggering of the “special military operation” by the Kremlin, while the Russian soldiers wiped heavy losses according to the attempts to take control of Ukrainian strategic positions. According to The Economist15,000 Russian soldiers had been killed after five months of conflict, or about a hundred per day[2]. It is in this context that aid from Pyongyang was mentioned on Russian television. Igor Korotchenko, defense expert, explained on Russia Channel One that ” Reports show 100,000 North Korean volunteers ready to take part in the conflict »[3].
Confirmed recently by the North Korean State Agency KCNA[4],, this support, even if it remains very far from the figure of 100,000 soldiers, proved to be substantial aid for the Moscow forces in the regions of Koursk and Belgorod, both located in Russian territory. Reuters, which relays South Korean sources, estimated that a total of 15,000 soldiers had been dispatched by Kim Jong-Un in the Russian territories[5]. However, it seems that this deployment does not respond to the most carefulness of strategies if we believe the first assessments.
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According to the Institute for the Study of War (Institute for the study of war), the North Korean troops are undergoing heavy losses in Koursk due to the lack of coverage by armored vehicles, but also their use by the Russian command to assault the fierce positions defended[6]. To this must be added a lack of preparation and training which contributes to further weighing down North Korean losses. The testimonies of two soldiers captured by the Ukrainian army are in this respect edifying and highlight the degree of indoctrination inflicted on men who ignore everything that is asked to lead, until the identity of their enemies who had been presented to them as South Koreans fighting for Ukrainians[7].
However, the aid provided by Pyongyang also includes the delivery of weapons and ammunition and it is certainly this point that concerns the most kyiv. Kim Jong-unit would have sent between 10,000 and 16,500 containers per boats, according to different sources; The most recent reports show 16,000 containers[8]. The latter mainly contain shells and rockets. According to Reuters and Open Source Center, which have diligent this survey, 70% of the ammunition used by Russian artillery come from North Korea. Although these shells are not of the best quality, they allow Moscow to maintain the intensity of its bombings. At the same time, nearly 400 North Korean engineers would have accompanied the delivery of missiles in order to optimize its use[9].
This military support is the direct consequence of a partnership signed on June 19, 2024 by North Korea and Russia. Cooperation between the two signatory countries, however, seems to have to extend to other sectors.
A rapprochement that goes beyond the context of the Ukrainian conflict
This mutual defense partnership dated June 19, 2024 provides that the two countries will be assisted in the event of an attack on one of the signatories. The North Korean presence in the Russian regions of Koursk and Belgorod is the logical application of this bilateral agreement. Nevertheless, it must be seen more as a message intended for the West insofar as it only makes a preexisting relationship without predicting automaticity in military interventions in the event of an attack or invasion. For example, such a relationship had already manifested itself in the space field when Seoul had revealed the presence of Russian technicians probably came to North Korea to bring their expertise in the launch of new spy satellites[10].
The conflict between Russia and Ukraine has been a determining factor in the acceleration of these relationships, Kim Jong-un seeing a way to pursue two objectives a priori contradictory: the development of its nuclear arsenal, which would for the moment include around 50 nuclear nuclear warheads[11]but also the revival of a moribund economy.
Since 2006, the United Nations Security Council has taken a dozen sanctions against Pyongyang in order to drive Kim Jong-Un to stop its nuclear program[12]. To this must be added the unilateral sanctions decided by the United States. Although such measures have strongly disrupted the North Korean economy by notably prohibiting any trade in arms and military equipment or by freeze the financial assets of North Korean citizens linked to the nuclear program, the regime has taken no step towards denuclearization.
The sale of its surplus ammunition in Moscow is therefore the occasion for Pyongyang to bypass the sanctions weighing on its economy, but also to diversify its commercial partners who so far limited almost exclusively to China. According to the New York Timesthe sale of weapons to Russia has reportedly brought in North Korea $ 5.5 billion. In addition, while the country’s exports represented $ 330 million in 2023, the deployment of its troops in Russia could represent an annual gain of $ 572 million for Pyongyang[13]. Now supported by Russia, which refuses to support new sanctions taken by the United Nations, North Korea has more latitude to continue the development of its nuclear arsenal.
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In addition to technological assistance and the opening of a new economic path in fact reducing the financial sanctions taken against him, the Ukrainian conflict is also the opportunity for Kim Jong-un, who frequently refers to the concept of ” neo-cold war To describe the current global relationships, to take a new dimension on the geopolitical scene. Eager to put an end to the domination of the West and the American hegemony, Kim Jong-uni thus recalled, on June 19, 2024, his will to “become a force accelerating the creation of a multipolar world, free from all domination, slavery, hegemony and violence”[14]. This would be an opportunity for his country, in particular because of his alliance with Russia of Vladimir Putin, to play a leading role in a new world order which would see the end of rules based order in force since the end of the Second World War.
-The validation of this hypothesis would allow the supreme chief of North Korea to give free rein to his expansionist inclinations fed by a geopolitical revisionism shared with Vladimir Putin and which could, in the long term, constitute a serious threat to South Korea. Pending the possible concretization of such a scenario, the collaboration between Moscow and Pyongyang continues to develop, as evidenced by the construction in progress of a road bridge spanning the Tumen River in order to link the two countries[15].
[1] https://www.nbcnews.com/world/ukraine/russia-confirms-north-korean-troops-kursk-rcna203137
[2] https://www.economist.com/europe/2022/07/24/how-heavy-are-russian-casualties-in-ukraine
[3] https://nypost.com/2022/08/05/russian-state-tv-north-korea-offers-kremlin-100000-troops/
[4] https://www.lefigaro.fr/international/la-coree-du-nord-confirme-pour-la-premiere-fois-le-deploiement-de-troupes-en-russie-20250428
[5] https://www.reuters.com/world/about-600-north-koreans-killed-ukraine-war-south-korean-lawmaker-says-2025-04-30/
[6] https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-december-16-2024
[7] https://www.wsj.com/world/north-korean-soldier-prisoners-ukraine-0ac12ca2?mod=article_inline
[8] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/apr/25/how-north-korea-arms-russia-in-ukraine-war
[9] https://www.wsj.com/world/asia/ukraine-says-north-korea-has-growing-role-in-war-2c28e17a?mod=Searchresults_pos13&page=2
[10] https://www.wsj.com/world/asia/north-koreas-fiery-spy-satellite-test-shows-more-than-failure-d1b72e0f?mod=article_inline
[11] https://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/arms-control-and-proliferation-profile-north-korea
[12] https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/north-korea-sanctions-un-nuclear-weapons
[13] https://www.nytimes.com/2024/12/17/world/asia/north-korea-russia-military-deal.html
[14] https://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/vladimirputinkimjongunpressconference.htm
[15] https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/fr/news/20250501_04/
