North Korea News Podcast by NK News - North Korean soldiers killed in Kursk, martial law fallout and Russian trains

Episode Date: December 17, 2024

In recent days, Kyiv has reported that a “significant number” of North Korean soldiers have participated in assaults on Ukrainian forces, allegedly suffering heavy losses as Russia uses them in more prominent combat roles. Data Correspondent Anton Sokolin joins the podcast to discuss what we know about Pyongyang’s military cooperation with Moscow and what to […]

Let's get started. Score more for less with our NK News Shop discount campaign. Ready to upgrade your wardrobe with some unique flair? At the NK News Shop, podcast listeners buying any two items from our t-shirt or hoodie collections will snag their third for half off. Whether you're eyeing our North Korea themed gear for yourself or as gifts, now is the perfect time to act. Don't miss out.

Head to shop.nknews.org and make the most of this limited time offer. That's shop.nknews.org. Hello listeners and welcome to the NK News Podcast. This is recorded on Tuesday, the 17th of December 2024 and I'm joined in the studio by Anton Sokolin. Anton, welcome back. Hello, Jacko. How are you? I'm great. Thank you. We have some North Korea-Russia related stories today. Of course, the big one that we're starting off with is the story that you published just yesterday titled significant number Quote unquote of North Korean troops assaulting Ukrainian voices and that's from Kyiv So tell us the news what what's happening or what's supposedly happening on the front there?

So a little backstory and of course whenever we talk about the troop deployment We need to keep in mind that whatever videos or messages or unconfirmed reports we come across on the net we should treat with a grain of salt of course. And basically a bit of background here would be that just a week prior Russian Telegram channels run by these called war bloggers, war correspondents, as we call them in Russian. They started publishing this report that North Koreans actually had their first combat. They engaged in combat with the Ukrainian forces in the Kursk region of Russia. And that they single-handedly basically recaptured this village of Plyokhovo from Ukrainian forces, ousting them out of the village and regaining control. Of course, there were lots of reports about, or from other work respondents,

that this was not actually the case and the Russians actually prepared the offensive and shouldered the major part of it it while letting basically the North Koreans to take the win over Ukrainian soldiers who have been weakened by that time. And now what we are seeing is that official Ukrainian sources and such retreat, President Zelensky and his intelligence, they confirmed that indeed there were these first clashes. And this is a significant development compared to previous reports, because maybe our listeners, our readers, they probably recall there's been a slew of these reports coming out since mid-October, I would say, early November,

basically saying like six North Korean soldiers were killed in this strike. There were first engagements. Oh, there were, there was no engagement. And then there was again, but this is a significant development because we are clearly seeing more evidence. There is evidence, at least videos published by the Ukrainian military purporting to show that North Korean soldiers actually engaged in actual fighting against the Ukrainian forces. Then we are also seeing these statements by Ukrainian leadership, Volodymyr Zelensky, backing up these videos explaining that there indeed there were clashes, there were losses. And the Ukrainian military intelligence also released reports showing on what happened explaining that there were this number of losses there. They vary because North Koreans operate within Russian

military units. So it's a mixed crowd. So you can't really tell who's who. And given the fact that North Koreans are also issued fake IDs, it complicates the... And there are Russian soldiers of Asian appearance as well. Of course, we should not rule that out too, because that's just part of Russian life. It's a multi-ethnic country. So... And what further confuses this, sorry to interrupt, there is that neither Russia nor North Korea has actually confirmed that there are North Korean troops embedded with the Russian army,

right? That's true. We haven't heard any official confirmation from the Russian authorities. Well, I would say there was some half-baked confirmation. Because, let me point it out, when, let's just rewind to mid-October, when these reports about the deployment just started coming out, the Kremlin out, Putin asked the question, are there North Korean troops? And what he said, there are satellite imagery. If there is satellite imagery, it must show something.

That literally I quote him. And of course, you can interpret it in a variety of ways. And then we are seeing that, of course, his spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, wouldn't ever confirm it. He would refer these questions to the Minister of Defense. The Minister of Defense would never respond to anything. So, and now we are seeing that this information is trickling down into the Russian public sphere

because we are seeing the work respondents talking about it openly, which is a new development. And the other thing is that we are also seeing some certain Russian lawmakers also commenting on this issue and basically explaining that, yeah, probably Kim Jong-un just wants his troops to get some combat experience because it's invaluable. And that's why they're there and they're actually helping the Russian army. So it's a win-win for both of us. And that's what we are seeing so far.

And so as far as I can make out from your reporting there, the way that the Russians are using North Korean troops at this stage is that the Russians go in first and prepare the ground and then allow the North Koreans to come in and kind of clean up. Well, you see that that's a very confusing part because we don't really know what it's like on the ground, right? There are reports that the north koreans actually stormed the ukrainian positions There is a report saying that they are actually in the rear guard and then the russians Orchestrate the entire offensive. So it's a bit confusing Uh, and there is even some talk that the north koreans have been kept in the rear

Intentionally so that they get to observe the operations on the ground, get some experience. And then after that, after they are a bit more trained, they could be let into the actual battle zone. So it's a bit confusing. It's still unconfirmed. So I wouldn't probably jump to any conclusions at this point because I also don't know honestly Do we yet have any credible reports of either? deaths or serious casualties or

Captured North Korean soldiers or defected North Korean soldiers. So that's actually one of the things probably all Korea watchers are looking out for because That would provide them the clearest the most are looking out for because that would provide the clearest, the most solid evidence there is to confirm their presence there and confirm their participation in the war. So one important thing here is that we haven't had any reports about North Korea. We had actually some reports back in a few months, a few weeks ago, we heard some reports about North Korea's defacting. We have never heard any follow-ups on that. They just disappeared, evaporated into thin air. And talking about prisoners, yes, we don't have those.

We only have sporadic reports from the Ukrainian intelligence saying, putting their losses somewhat between 30 and 200, which is a pretty big range. And again, considering that there are some Russians mixed into that number, it's very hard to weed out North Korea. And so we are still on the lookout for that. One thing I would mention, and it's probably what the Ukrainian authorities are supposed to do, is to, if they have a chance to actually have a North Korean prison of war, it would be really helpful for them at this point not to push their propaganda narrative about North Koreans eating dogs or forced to do certain crazy things that have been circulating online and actually

present the information as as balanced as possible because at this point when there are so many fakes around, so many unverified reports, it is extremely important to present this picture in a balanced way. And one way is to do that is to actually have a reporter and there's been cases when Ukrainian authorities allow reporters to talk to Russian prisoners or and ask them direct questions What's up, and they would tell them of course we still have to treat it with a grain of salt But that's the best probably we can get so far so to wrap up this story then Anton currently and you're looking at this You know every day. What do you believe is is Reliable and what do you believe is credible? Well reliable and credible. I do believe that not well again as I said

I would just probably refer back to that we have to treat everything with a grain of salt. We should be on the lookout but I think whenever we see some official data and official information coming out directly from Ukrainian national authorities I think that's the one we should trust most and the second probably trusted the second category of trusted sources would be Ukrainian military and Russian foreign course of reward correspondence as well but still we should we should be really cautious and it takes time it takes patience but we do must our job of verifying where these certain videos came from because for example there were videos showing an

alleged funeral of a North Korean general and I mean seriously that's that's not even that. Yeah, I mean, ultimately, the standard rules of journalism apply that multiple independent sources lead to credibility and that all video and photography evidence has to be verified these days because it could be from last year, five years ago, or it could be deepfakes. That's right. All right, well, let's move on to we've got two brief stories to go with. This one is definitely still related to the war between Russia and Ukraine, but it's also related to the short-lived martial law here in South Korea that I understand that before

December the 4th it is never the fourth right when when martial law was there was a seven of the third gosh certain for the Yeah the night of the third to the fourth that there was It did appear after a visit by senior Ukrainian military officials to South Korea that South Korea might be close to sending some lethal weaponry or military assistance to Ukraine. Now with the president suspended under impeachment, that looks less likely than before. Tell us a little bit more about that.

Right. We could see that prior to the actual obtaining whatever evidence we have about North Korean deployment in Ukraine, there were Kiev's attempts to get South Korea on board and get South Korea more engaged in the war and the conflict by either providing certain weaponry, weapon systems, or maybe even dispatching a monitoring group. So there were these talks about that. And well, we can see right now that basically this is how all of this has been thrown into air because, well, the key decision makers, I would say,

include Yoon Seok-yeol and his previous- Minister of National Defense. Exactly. They are all out of office. And to be frank, South Korea is very busy in turn with internal domestic affairs right now and probably it was a big disappointment in Kiev to learn this well and I also need to remind you that not only Ukrainian officials were here but there was also the president of Kyrgyzstan who actually witnessed

firsthand the whole turmoil, how the whole thing went down because he had a meeting with Yung Tsokler hours before the declaration, the exact same day. And then the following day he had a business forum and I hope it went well and they got some good beneficial contracts, but the turmoil basically casts shadow not only on the Ukrainian ties. Now if, let's say, at the end of the Constitutional Court's review of the impeachment, if President Yun is permanently out of office and if there is a new election and if for example somebody from the Democratic Party wins the presidency in Korea I would not be expecting this talk of military aid to Ukraine to continue right that the Democratic Party is not really interested in that would you agree it's very unlikely that they would

pursue that it is unlikely and I would add that given their just historic stance on North Korea, it's natural to expect that they would probably pursue at least some form of rapprochement with North Korea. And that of course eliminates such things as adding more sanctions on the North Korean regime, imposing sanctions on Russia, and probably it includes also maintaining somewhat amicable ties with Russian leadership as well. Right, okay, so that's bad news for Ukraine right now, at least in terms of direct

military assistance from South Korea. And our last story to talk about briefly is that it looks like train services have begun once again, regular train services between Russia and North Korea. That's right. The passenger train was launched yesterday, the first one since 2020. Wow, yes, since the pandemic. Yeah.

Certainly the North Koreans remember since they're opening up. And yeah, well, it's a notable development because the Russians now can travel there, not only by air, but it was, to be perfectly honest, it's not full-scale resumption because it involves a very short ride just between two border crossings, between the Rassan station, oh no, pardon, Hassan station in Russia,

and the Tumengan station in North Korea. So it's a 17 minute ride. 17 minutes? Yes. That's very, very short. Yes. So technically you're just crossing into North Korea and then you're supposed to transfer there to another train and go to Pyongyang by train if there is an option like that

or take a bus. Who are we expecting might use this? Would this be for Russian tourists? Well primarily primarily we are expecting that it's gonna be Russian tourists, of course, but again it's a railroad, right? And railways can be used for a variety of ways and we shouldn't rule out the possibility of them using it to transport not only, for example, cargos, for example, like coal or some goods, but also, of course, as people, personnel. The imagination is the limit here because it could be overseas laborers.

Right, North Korean workers going to Russia. Exactly. Putin has already flagged this possibility that Russia would accept them because he doesn't see anything wrong with that. And well, talking about the troop deployment, well, that's also another possibility. And of course, Russian tourists as well. Well, there we go. So a lot happening there between North Korea and Russia these days. Thank you very much Anton Sokolin for walking us through these three stories and keep up your wonderful work. No problem.

And Merry Christmas. And Merry Christmas. And Merry Christmas to you and all our listeners. Thank you. Welcome to a new realm of insights into the Korean Peninsula. At Korea Risk Group, we delve deep into the complexities of North and South Korea, offering bespoke analyses that empower decision makers. Whether you're in government, business or academia, our tailored solutions provide clarity in an opaque region. Let our team guide your strategy with data-driven insights and on-the-ground intelligence.

Step into a world of informed decision making and visit careerriskgroup.com today. Ladies and gentlemen, that brings us to the end of our podcast episode for today. Our thanks go to Brian Betts and Alana Hill for facilitating this episode and to our post-recording producer genius, Gabby Magnuson, who cuts out all the extraneous noises, awkward silences, bodily functions, and fixes the audio levels. Thank you and listen again next time.