Seoul demands ‘immediate withdrawal’ of North Korean troops in Russia

South Korea summons Russian ambassador over Pyongyang’s alleged dispatch of soldiers to support Moscow’s war in Ukraine.

South Korea has summoned the Russian ambassador to criticise Pyongyang’s decision to send hundreds of soldiers to support Moscow’s war in Ukraine, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs says as it calls for their immediate withdrawal.

In Pyongyang’s first such deployment overseas, about 1,500 special forces soldiers have arrived in Russia and are likely to head to the front lines after acclimatising, Seoul’s spy agency said Friday, adding that additional forces are set to depart soon.

South Korea has long accused the nuclear-armed North of supplying Russia with weapons for use in Ukraine, and the North’s leader, Kim Jong Un, signed a military deal with Russian President Vladimir Putin in June.

Seoul expressed its “grave concerns regarding North Korea’s recent dispatch of troops to Russia and strongly urged the immediate withdrawal of North Korean forces”, Vice Foreign Minister Kim Hong-kyun told Russian Ambassador Georgiy Zinoviev on Monday.

Seoul’s spy agency released detailed satellite images showing what it said was the first batch of 1,500 North Korean special forces from the elite “Storm Corps” to arrive in Vladivostok on Russian military vessels.

Any military cooperation between the two countries violates multiple United Nations Security Council resolutions, Vice Foreign Minister Kim said.

“We condemn North Korea’s illegal military cooperation, including its dispatch of troops to Russia, in the strongest terms,” the Foreign Affairs Ministry quoted him as saying.

“We will respond jointly with the international community by mobilising all available means against acts that threaten our core security interests.”

Zinoviev “stressed that cooperation between Russia and North Korea … is not directed against the interests of South Korea’s security”, the Russian embassy said in a statement.

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov also said on Monday that Moscow will “continue developing this cooperation further”.

“North Korea is our close neighbour and partner, and we develop relations in all areas, and it’s our sovereign right,” he told journalists in Moscow while declining to comment on whether Russia is using North Korean troops.

Later on Monday, South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol spoke to NATO chief Mark Rutte, urging the alliance to take “concrete countermeasures” against growing Russian-North Korean cooperation.

NATO has not yet confirmed the North Korean troop deployment, but Rutte said in a post on X that it “would mark a significant escalation” in the conflict.

British Foreign Secretary David Lammy, who was in Seoul on Monday, called Russia’s actions “reckless and illegal” and added that London would work with Seoul to respond, according to Yoon’s office.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has accused Pyongyang of preparing to send 10,000 soldiers to Russia and on Sunday called for a strong international reaction.

The United States said on Friday it could not confirm reports that North Korean troops were fighting but said, if true, it would be a “dangerous development” in Russia’s war against Ukraine.