North Korea and Russia send political shockwaves with Ukraine war moves

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MOSCOW/SEOUL (Reuters) -North Korea’s foreign minister arrived in Russia on Tuesday for talks as the Russia-Ukraine war appeared to take a dangerous new turn, with NATO and South Korea expressing alarm that North Korean troops could soon be joining in on Moscow’s side.

U.S. President Joe Biden said Ukraine should strike back against North Korean troops “if they cross into Ukraine.”

NATO said on Monday thousands of North Korean troops were moving toward the front line, a development which has prompted Kyiv to call for more weapons and an international plan to keep those troops at bay. 

The Pentagon confirmed on Tuesday that some North Korean soldiers are in the Kursk region, a Russian border area where Ukrainian forces staged a major incursion in August and hold hundreds of square kilometres of territory. A couple of thousand more are heading there, it said.

The United States has said any North Korean troops fighting in the war would be “fair game” for Ukrainian attacks and that Washington would not impose any fresh limits on Ukraine’s use of U.S. weapons if North Korea entered the fight.

South Korea, which remains technically at war with the nuclear-armed North decades after the 1950-1953 Korean War, also condemned the deployments, with officials in Seoul worried about what Russia may be providing to Pyongyang in return.

North Korean Foreign Minister Choe Son Hui arrived in Russia’s far east on Tuesday on her way to Moscow, Russian state media said. Russian state news agencies said it was not clear who Choe, making her second visit in six weeks, would meet. 

The Kremlin said Russian President Vladimir Putin had no plans to meet her.

Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said after talks with South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol on Tuesday that the North Korean moves were sending the war into a new phase.

“This war is becoming internationalized, extending beyond two countries,” Zelenskiy said on X.

“We agreed to strengthen intelligence and expertise exchange, intensify contacts at all levels, especially the highest, in order to develop an action strategy and countermeasures to address this escalation,” Zelenskiy said.

Yoon told Zelenskiy that if North Korea receives aid from Russia and is able to glean military experience and knowledge from its involvement in the war it would pose a “great threat” to South Korea’s security, his office said.

South Korea has said it may start supplying weapons to Ukraine if North Korean troops joined Russia’s war. Putin has not denied the presence of North Korean troops in the country.

INFANTRY ROLES

What role the North Korean troops may play is unclear.

The Pentagon said initial indications are that Russia might field them in infantry roles.

“We remain concerned that Russia intends to use these soldiers in combat or to support combat operations against Ukrainian forces in Kursk,” Pentagon spokesperson Major General Patrick Ryder told reporters, adding he could not corroborate reports that North Korean troops were in Ukraine itself.

The Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) think tank said the number of North Korean forces involved “make this more than a symbolic effort.”

“But the troops will likely be in support roles and constitute less than 1% of Russia’s forces,” it said. 

“Russia is desperate for additional manpower, and this is one element of Russia’s effort to fill the ranks without a second mobilization,” it added, noting the presence could grow.

The troops are also likely to play a political role for Russia and North Korea, strengthening their hands in relations with China, which has an uneasy partnership with both countries, and sending a message to Washington and its allies, Western diplomats and analysts said.

“The closer Moscow’s ties to Pyongyang, the more leverage it expects over U.S. allies as well as China,” Gilbert Rozman, of The Asan Forum, wrote for the U.S.-based 38 North programme. 

Moscow needed a partner hostile to the status quo, wary of China but unwilling to antagonize it, and helpful in meeting arms or perhaps labor needs, he said.

A few thousand North Korean troops will not change the course of the war so it may be a Russian attempt to underscore to the United States just how disruptive Moscow can be if it wants, said one diplomat who spoke on condition of anonymity.

“Integrating North Korean troops into a very complex war machine is not easy. But using their presence to scare the United States and its allies in Asia is quite simple,” the diplomat said.

TROOPS TRAINING

The Ukraine conflict broke out when Russia invaded its neighbor in February 2022 and has since developed into a war of attrition largely fought along front lines in eastern Ukraine, with huge numbers of casualties on both sides.

The Pentagon estimated 10,000 North Korean troops had been deployed to eastern Russia for training, up from an estimate of 3,000 troops last Wednesday.

The military in Russia was trying to teach military terminology to the North Korean soldiers, South Korean lawmakers briefed by the country’s spy agency said on Tuesday.

Moscow was also continuing to provide technical support for North Korea’s attempts to field a fleet of spy satellites, the lawmakers said. 

For months, North Korea has been providing Russia with short-range ballistic missiles, artillery shells, and other weapons, according to intelligence officials in the United States, South Korea, and Ukraine.

(Reporting by Reuters; Writing by Josh Smith, Mark John and Phil Stewart; Editing by Angus MacSwan, Ros Russell and Daniel Wallis)