SEOUL — South Korea’s National Intelligence Service confirmed on Sunday that a North Korean special operations brigade of approximately 1,500 troops has been embedded with Russian military forces in western Ukraine — the first official confirmation that North Korean personnel are directly participating in combat operations alongside Russian units, NIS chief Cho Kyoung-tae told a closed-door parliamentary briefing.
According to intelligence assessed by the NIS, the troops — drawn from the 11th Storm Corps, North Korea’s most elite light infantry formation — have been deployed near Kharkiv as part of a Russian assault formation. Cho told lawmakers that South Korean intelligence had tracked the unit’s movement from North Korea to a staging area in Russia’s Far East before its transfer to the Ukrainian front.
“We have confirmed with high confidence that North Korean special operations forces are fighting alongside Russian units in the Kharkiv sector,” Cho said. “This represents a qualitative escalation in North Korea’s military involvement in the European conflict and a direct violation of multiple UN Security Council resolutions.”
South Korea’s foreign ministry summoned Russia’s ambassador in Seoul on Sunday morning and delivered a formal demarche demanding the immediate withdrawal of North Korean personnel from Ukrainian territory. The ministry said the deployment constituted “a serious breach of international law and a destabilising act that changes the character of the conflict.”
NATO secretary general Mark Rutte described the development as “a significant escalation that changes the nature of this conflict.” He said NATO would consult with member states on an appropriate response and called on North Korea to “cease immediately its illegal deployment of personnel to a conflict that is not theirs.” The NATO statement stopped short of specifying what countermeasures might follow.
The White House National Security Council said the United States was “deeply concerned” by the reports and was coordinating with allies and partners on a response. A spokesperson said the development underscored the broader strategic cooperation between Russia and North Korea that had been established since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine began.
North Korea’s state media, KCNA, dismissed the reports as “fabricated Western propaganda designed to justify continued military support for the Zelensky regime.” A foreign ministry spokesperson said North Korea’s military cooperation with Russia was “fully legal and conducted in accordance with international law” — a reference to the mutual defence clause in the strategic partnership agreement signed by the two countries in 2024.
Ukraine’s military intelligence directorate confirmed it had observed evidence of North Korean personnel operating in the Kharkiv region in recent weeks but said it could not independently confirm the numerical strength of the deployment. Ukrainian military sources said coalition forces had engaged with the unit in at least two firefights, resulting in casualties on both sides.
Sources: Yonhap, Reuters, AP, BBC, The Guardian, NK News, Seoul Shinmun, JoongAng Ilbo, NIS South Korea, NATO, Ukraine Military Intelligence, KCNA
Written by Kenji Tanaka, Asia-Pacific Bureau Chief
Kenji Tanaka
Kenji Tanaka covers Asia Pacific security, technology, and geopolitics from Tokyo.