A TV screen shows an image of soldiers believed to be from North Korea standing in line to receive supplies from Russia during a news program at Seoul Railway Station, in Seoul, South Korea, on Oct. 21.Ahn Young-joon/The Associated Press
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said the deployment of North Korean troops in the Russia-Ukraine war will likely escalate the conflict, South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol’s office said on Wednesday after a phone call between the leaders.
The war will leave a greater impact on the security environment of Europe and the Indo-Pacific, Trudeau said, proposing closer co-operation between the two countries on the developing situation, according to Yoon’s office.
The United States confirmed on Tuesday some North Korean soldiers were in the Kursk region, a Russian border area where Ukrainian forces staged a major incursion in August and hold hundreds of square kilometres of territory.
A couple of thousand more were heading there, the Pentagon said.
“Prime Minister Trudeau said that the possibility of the Ukraine war becoming more fierce has increased with the North Korean troops’ deployment to Russia, and this will have an impact on the overall security of Europe and the Indo-Pacific,” Yoon’s office said.
South Korean officials have said some of the North Korean troops may have been moved to the front line and expressed worry about what Russia may be providing to Pyongyang in return.
Yoon said the pace of North Korean troop deployment to Russia had been faster than expected, creating a dangerous situation, his office said.
South Korea’s Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) reported “it is possible” some North Korean troops had been sent to battlefield in Ukraine but it did not have clear intelligence of such a move yet, members of parliament briefed by the DIA said.
There is a presence of North Korean military officers in the front lines but they are likely part of an advanced unit that had been dispatched with shipments of North Korean weapons to aid Russia in the war, member of parliament Lee Seung-kweun said.
Lee was speaking to reporters after a closed-door parliamentary hearing by the DIA. He said the troops now being readied for deployment in battlefield could suffer heavy casualties because they are not trained for drone warfare.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has not denied the involvement of North Korean troops in the war but said it was Russia’s business how it implements a partnership treaty he and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un signed in June.
The Pentagon estimated 10,000 North Korean troops had been deployed to eastern Russia for training, up from an estimate of 3,000 troops last Wednesday.