North Korea has sent about 10,000 troops to Russia to train and fight in Ukraine within "the next several weeks," the Pentagon said Monday, in a move that western leaders say will intensify the almost three-year war and jolt relations in the Indo-Pacific region.
Some of the North Korean soldiers have already moved closer to Ukraine, Pentagon spokeswoman Sabrina Singh said, and were believed to be heading for the Kursk border region, where Russia has been struggling to push back a Ukrainian incursion.
Earlier Monday, NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte NATO confirmed recent Ukrainian intelligence reports that some North Korean military units were already in the Kursk region.
Adding thousands of North Korean soldiers to Europe鈥檚 biggest conflict since World War II will pile more pressure on Ukraine鈥檚 weary and overstretched army. It will also stoke geopolitical tensions in the Korean Peninsula and the wider Indo-Pacific region, including Japan and Australia, Western officials say.
Russian President Vladimir Putin is keen to reshape global power dynamics. He sought to build a counterbalance to Western influence with a summit of BRICS countries, including the leaders of China and India, in Russia last week. He has sought direct help for the war from Iran, which has supplied drones, and North Korea, which has shipped large amounts of ammunition, according to Western governments.
Rutte told reporters in Brussels that the North Korean deployment represents 鈥渁 significant escalation鈥 in Pyongyang's involvement in the conflict and 鈥渁 dangerous expansion of Russia鈥檚 war.鈥
U.S. President Joe Biden also called the deployment 鈥渄angerous. Very dangerous.鈥
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Secretary of State Antony Blinken will meet with their South Korean counterparts later this week in Washington.
Singh said Austin and Defense Minister Kim Yong-hyun will discuss the deployment of North Korean soldiers in Ukraine. There will be no limitations on the use of U.S.-provided weapons on those forces, Singh said.
鈥淚f we see DPRK troops moving in towards the front lines, they are co-belligerents in the war,鈥 Singh said, using the acronym for the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, or North Korea. 鈥淭his is a calculation that North Korea has to make.鈥
Russia鈥檚 Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov shrugged off Rutte鈥檚 comments and noted that Pyongyang and Moscow signed a joint security pact last June. He stopped short of confirming North Korean soldiers were in Russia.
Lavrov claimed that Western military instructors long have been covertly deployed to Ukraine to help its military use long-range weapons provided by Western partners.
Ukraine, whose defenses are under severe Russian pressure in its eastern Donetsk region, could get more bleak news from next week鈥檚 U.S. presidential election. A Donald Trump victory could see key U.S. military help dwindle.
In Moscow, the Defense Ministry announced Monday that Russian troops have captured the Donetsk village of Tsukuryne 鈥 the latest settlement to succumb to the slow-moving Russian onslaught.
Rutte spoke in Brussels after a high-level South Korean delegation, including top intelligence and military officials as well as senior diplomats, briefed the alliance鈥檚 32 national ambassadors at NATO headquarters.
Rutte said NATO is 鈥渁ctively consulting within the alliance, with Ukraine, and with our Indo-Pacific partners,鈥 on developments. He said he was due to talk soon with South Korea鈥檚 president and Ukraine鈥檚 defense minister.
鈥淲e continue to monitor the situation closely,鈥 he said. He did not take questions after the statement.
The South Koreans showed no evidence of North Korean troops in Kursk, according to European officials who were present for the 90-minute exchange and spoke to The Associated Press about the security briefing on condition of anonymity.
It鈥檚 unclear how or when NATO allies might respond to the North Korean involvement. They could, for example, lift restrictions that prevent Ukraine from using Western-supplied weapons for long-range strikes on Russian soil.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, citing intelligence reports, claimed last Friday that North Korean troops would be on the battlefield within days.
He previously said his government had information that some 10,000 troops from North Korea were being readied to join Russian forces fighting against his country.
Days before Zelenskyy spoke, American and South Korean officials said there was evidence North Korea had dispatched troops to Russia.
___
Copp reported from Washington. Associated Press writer Barry Hatton in Lisbon, Portugal, contributed to this report.
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