Several Ukrainian and South Korean media outlets reported this week that communist North Korea was preparing to send military technicians to help Russia invade Ukraine. At press time, North Korea had not confirmed this, but the Pentagon cited it as a cause for concern on Tuesday.
The alarm over the possible presence of North Korean troops on the Ukrainian battlefield came after a brief but significant visit to Pyongyang by Russian dictator Vladimir Putin, who signed a mutual defense treaty with communist dictator Kim Jong Un that obligates either country to act if either comes under attack.
North Korea’s state media (the only legitimate news source in the country) celebrated Putin’s visit for several days, welcoming him as a friend of the communist rogue state, and publishing increasingly frequent propaganda articles denouncing Ukraine and updating the public on any Ukrainian attacks on Russia that could be subject to legal action within the language of the Mutual Defense Treaty. Neither Moscow nor Pyongyang have publicly clarified what military action would trigger the treaty.
The first reports that North Korea may be preparing to intervene in Ukraine were reported by South Korea’s conservative TV Chosun on June 21. ClaimedCiting an anonymous South Korean official, the report said North Korea will “send a large-scale engineering unit to the occupied Donetsk Oblast as early as July 2024 to help rebuild infrastructure in the occupied city of Donetsk.” translation by Ukrainska Pravda.
Donetsk is one of two regions of Ukraine that make up the eastern region known as Donbas, where war raged for nearly a decade between Ukrainian forces and Russian-backed separatist groups before Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022. Putin annexed Donetsk in September 2022 along with other parts of Donbas, Luhansk, and the eastern Kherson and Zaporizhia oblasts.
TV Chosun’s report contradicts President Putin’s own comments the previous day, in which he claimed that neither Russia nor North Korea had currently asked the other for military assistance.
“As for whether there is a possibility of somehow using each other’s capabilities in this conflict, there is no need for that, because we have not asked anyone for it and no one has proposed it to us,” Putin said, according to Russian media reports. Interfax Translated By the Ukrainian military.
In this photo released by the Primorsky Krai government, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un walks in front of a guard of honor before leaving Artyom, near Vladivostok in Russia’s Far East, Sunday, Sept. 17, 2023. (Courtesy of Primorsky Krai government, via The Associated Press)
Pentagon spokesman Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder was asked Tuesday about TV Chosun’s exaggerated claims and the possibility of North Korea being involved in an invasion of Ukraine.
“That’s certainly something to look at,” Ryder said. Responded“If I were North Korea’s military personnel manager, I would question the choice to use its own troops as cannon fodder in an illegal war against Ukraine.”
“We know what kind of casualties the Russian forces are suffering, but again, we’re continuing to monitor it closely,” he added.
NK News, an independent North Korea monitoring media report However, North Korea had not announced any such developments as of June 27, nor had it confirmed the reports, it said Thursday.
“While this possibility cannot be completely ruled out, neither North Korea nor Russia have made any such announcements so far,” NK News reported. ObservedNorth Korea’s main state media outlet, the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA), reported Thursday that Pak Jong Chon, vice chairman of the Central Military Commission, expressed support for the recent Russian incursion but made no mention of sending in North Korean troops.
But there remain fears of a worsening situation in Ukraine fuelled by North Korean soldiers, given past reports of Russia tricking young men from countries like India and Cuba into fighting on the front lines. The nature of the mutual defense treaty also raises concerns.
According to Putin, the pact is a “comprehensive partnership” that “provides for mutual assistance in the event of aggression against any of the parties to the treaty.” However, the definition of “aggression” in this context has not been clarified, leaving it unclear whether Pyongyang would intervene.
North Korea has not publicly stated that it would join an invasion of Ukraine, but its state media has launched a flood of anti-Ukrainian propaganda, accusing the Ukrainian government of being an aggressive “puppet” regime backed by the U.S. North Korea is technically at war with the United States, South Korea’s biggest ally, because the 1950 Korean War never ended with a peace agreement or formal surrender by either side.
Thursday, Korean Central News Agency Published The lengthy statement condemning Kiev for using US ATACMS missiles to target occupied Crimea – Russia’s 2014 invasion and annexation of Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula – a precursor to a 2022 invasion, but it elicited no meaningful response from then-US President Barack Obama.
“Ukrainian military gangs attacked the Russian city of Sevastopol and committed inhumane crimes by killing civilians. [sic] “On June 23, an ATACMS missile tipped with a U.S.-supplied cluster bomb struck the Ukrainian capital of Kiev,” the Korean Central News Agency reported, calling the attack a “terrorist attack” by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
“What cannot be overlooked is the fact that Zelensky’s puppet clique carried out the above-mentioned bloody attack shortly after their American masters lifted restrictions on the use of US-supplied weapons to attack Russian territory,” the Korean Central News Agency reported.
“A stronger response to protect Russia’s national interests and the lives and safety of its citizens is an irrefutable and legitimate right to self-defense,” state media reported. Claimed.
