South Korea recalls envoy over claims North Korean forces helping Putin's war

South Korea yesterday demanded the immediate pullout of North Korean troops allegedly deployed in Russia as it summoned the Russian ambassador to protest deepening military cooperation between Pyongyang and Moscow.

- HYUNG-JIN KIM

South Korea’s spy agency said on Friday it had confirmed that North Korea sent 1,500 special operation forces to Russia earlier this month to support Moscow’s war against Ukraine. Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy earlier said his government had intelligence that 10,000 North Korean soldiers were being prepared to join invading Russian forces.

During a meeting with Russian ambassador Georgy Zinoviev, South Korea’s vice-foreign minister Kim Hong Kyun “condemned in the strongest terms” North Korea’s troop dispatch that he said poses “a grave security threat” to South Korea and the international community, the South Korean Foreign Ministry said in a statement.