The spokesperson for the American State Department expressed its “concern” on Tuesday evening, November 12, regarding “more than 10,000 North Korean soldiers sent to Russia.” Most are in the Kursk region, the scene of a Ukrainian operation.
Enough to corroborate the Ukrainian accusations. The United States confirmed Tuesday evening, November 12, that North Korean troops were “engaged in combat operations” alongside Russian soldiers in the Russian region of Kursk, a small part of which is occupied by Ukrainian forces,
“I can confirm that more than 10,000 North Korean troops have been sent to Russia, most of them arriving in the Kursk region, where they began to engage” in the fighting, said US State Department spokesperson Vedant Patel on Tuesday, emphasizing “worry” of the United States regarding this alliance. He said Moscow trained North Korean soldiers in artillery, the use of drones and basic infantry operations.
According to Kyiv, some 11,000 North Korean soldiers are already deployed in Russia and have started fighting against Ukrainian forces in the Kursk region where the latter have been on the offensive since August.
This deployment greatly worries Western countries which support Ukraine. At the end of October, American Defense Minister Lloyd Austin called on North Korea to “withdraw its troops from Russia”, while the deputy American ambassador to the UN warned that North Korean soldiers would leave “necessarily in body bags” if they entered Ukraine to support Russia.
“Integration” into the Russian army
“We are incredibly concerned about Russia’s decision to turn to North Korea to provide soldiers to continue its brutal war against Ukraine”added Vedant Patel on Tuesday. “Russia’s success on the battlefield […] will largely depend on how well the Russians can integrate [les soldats nord-coréens] to their armyhe further said, highlighting the challenges as “interoperability or the language barrier”.
The Kremlin has so far evaded questions about this presence of North Korean reinforcements. But North Korea ratified a historic defense agreement with Russia on Monday, sealing their rapprochement, according to the official North Korean agency KCNA. Russian President Vladimir Putin also signed this mutual defense treaty, the Kremlin announced this weekend. Concluded during a rare visit by Vladimir Putin to Pyongyang in June, this treaty between two of Washington’s beasts provides in particular “immediate military aid” reciprocal in the event of an attack against one of the two countries.
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