SEOUL: A North Korean soldier who was captured whereas preventing in Russia’s war against Ukraine has died of his wounds, South Korea’s spy company mentioned on Friday (Dec 27).
Pyongyang has deployed 1000’s of troops to strengthen Russia’s army, including in the Kursk border region the place Ukraine mounted a shock border incursion in August.
A kind of North Korean troopers was captured alive by the Ukrainian military on Thursday, a South Korean intelligence supply advised AFP, including that the situation the place he was seized was not identified.
Hours later, Seoul’s Nationwide Intelligence Service (NIS) mentioned that the soldier had succumbed to his wounds.
“It has been confirmed by means of an allied intelligence company that the North Korean soldier captured alive on Dec 26 has simply handed away as a consequence of worsening wounds,” the South’s spy company mentioned in a press release.
Friday’s affirmation got here days after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy mentioned that just about 3,000 North Korean troopers had been “killed or wounded” as far as they joined Russian troops in fight.
South Korea’s intelligence service had beforehand put the variety of killed or wounded North Koreans at 1,000, saying the excessive casualty fee might be right down to an unfamiliar battlefield atmosphere and their lack of functionality to counter drone assaults.
Pyongyang’s troopers had been additionally being “utilised as expendable frontline assault models”, lawmaker Lee Seong-kweun mentioned, talking final week after a briefing by South Korea’s spy company.
