Ukrainian military had captured two North Korean soldiers
The two North Korean soldiers captured by the Ukrainian military in the Kursk region of Russia are undergoing identification and questioning in Kyiv after being transferred for medical treatment, according to the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) over the weekend.
The pair, who are being investigated by the SBU with support from locally dispatched agents from the South Korean National Intelligence Service (NIS), were born in 2005 and 1999, according to AFP, which cited an announcement by the SBU.
The two North Korean soldiers are being investigated through a South Korean interpreter from the NIS as the soldiers do not speak English, Russian or Ukrainian.
The NIS also confirmed on Sunday that the Ukrainian military had captured two North Koreans and that the agency is cooperating with Ukraine in their interrogation.
"One of the captured North Korean soldiers stated during the interrogation that he arrived in Russia in November of last year and received military training from the Russian side for a week before moving to the battlefield and that he thought that he was moving to receive training, not to fight in a war,” an NIS official said. “He only found out that he had been deployed for combat after arriving in Russia."
The soldier born in 2005 was a rifleman and was carrying a Russian military ID card that made him appear to be a 26-year-old from the Tuva Republic in southern Siberia at the time of his capture.
The soldier said that he had received the ID card when his combat unit trained with Russian units in Russia for a week last fall and that he believed that they were sent to the front for training, not to fight Ukrainian forces.
The other soldier, born in 1999, is said to be interrogated by writing his answers on paper because he cannot speak due to a sniper wound to his jaw.
The SBU also released a video of the two soldiers. The 20-year-old soldier was lying in a hospital bed with bandages on his hands, while the 26-year-old drank water through a straw.
The SBU said they are being treated at a hospital and are being “detained under appropriate conditions that meet the requirements of international law.”
According to what Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky revealed via Telegram, the 84th Tactical Group of the Ukrainian Special Operations Forces and the Airborne Troops captured the pair. One was captured on Thursday, and the time of the other capture was not mentioned.
This is the first time that Ukrainian authorities have captured a North Korean soldier deployed to Kursk and officially released personal information.
Earlier, Ukraine released a photo last month, claiming to have captured a North Korean soldier in Kursk, but the NIS confirmed that the soldier died a day after being captured due to injuries.
Zelensky has said that the Ukrainian military captured several North Korean soldiers after that, but all of them died from serious injuries.
North Korea has been sending soldiers to Kursk to help Russia since October of last year. The number of troops dispatched so far is estimated at around 11,000.