Ukraine says it captured two North Korean soldiers in Russia’s Kursk | News of the war between Russia and Ukraine

The wounded soldiers were transferred to Kiev for questioning by Ukrainian investigators in cooperation with South Korean intelligence.

Ukraine announced that it had captured two North Korean soldiers in Russia’s Kursk region and taken them to Kiev, where they were being interrogated by investigators.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said the two POWs were “communicating” with the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), the country’s domestic intelligence agency.

“Russian forces and other North Korean military personnel routinely execute their own wounded to erase any evidence of North Korea’s involvement in the war,” Zelensky wrote on X on Saturday.

The Ukrainian Security Service said in a statement that one of the captured soldiers had no documents at all, while the other carried a Russian military ID card in the name of a man from Tuva, a Russian region on the border with Mongolia.

“The prisoners do not speak Ukrainian, English or Russian, so communication with them is carried out through Korean translators in cooperation with South Korean intelligence,” the statement said.

According to the Ukrainian Security Service, one soldier claimed that he was told that he was going to Russia for training, not to fight against Ukraine.

The agency said the two men received medical care in line with the Geneva Conventions.

Ukraine has not provided any evidence that the captured soldiers are from North Korea.

Kiev has repeatedly said that North Korean forces are fighting in the Kursk region, where they launched an incursion in August, claiming control of several hundred square kilometers of territory.

However, this is the first time the country’s intelligence services say they have had the opportunity to interrogate North Korean soldiers. While Ukraine previously claimed to have captured North Korean soldiers during fighting, it said they were severely injured and died shortly afterwards.

Last month, a senior Ukrainian military official claimed that about 200 North Korean soldiers fighting alongside Russian forces in Kursk were killed or wounded in the battle.

The North Korean casualty estimate came weeks after Ukraine announced that Pyongyang had sent between 10,000 and 12,000 troops to Russia to help it in its nearly three-year-long war against its much smaller neighbour.

The White House and Pentagon confirmed last month that North Korean forces are fighting on the front lines in largely infantry positions.