Zelensky says two North Korean soldiers fighting for Russia were captured in Kursk region

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said troops operating in Russia’s Kursk region had captured two North Korean soldiers, the first time Ukraine has captured alive soldiers from the isolated country.

“Our soldiers captured North Korean military personnel in the Kursk region. Two soldiers, although wounded, survived and were sent to Kiev, where they are currently in contact with Ukrainian security services,” Zelensky told X on Saturday said in a statement, which included several photos of injured soldiers.

According to Ukrainian and Western assessments, about 11,000 North Korean troops are deployed in the Kursk region, where Ukrainian forces occupied hundreds of square kilometers after launching a cross-border invasion last August.

Last week, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said more than 1,000 North Korean troops were killed or wounded in Kursk in the last week of December.

“This is not an easy task: Russian troops and other North Korean military personnel routinely execute the wounded to eliminate any evidence of North Korea’s involvement in the war in Ukraine,” Zelensky said of the two captured North Korean soldiers.

soldier on bunk bed

The Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) released footage purportedly showing the soldiers.

An SBU spokesman said in the video that one of the North Koreans was captured by Ukrainian special forces on January 9, while the other was captured by Ukrainian paratroopers.

“They are being held in appropriate conditions consistent with the requirements of international law,” the SBU said.

The video shows two soldiers lying on bunk beds in a cell. One of them suffered an injury to his jaw. No one spoke. An unidentified doctor said the second soldier suffered a broken leg.

An SBU spokesman said that with the cooperation of South Korean intelligence services, “communication with them was conducted through Korean translators.”

Saturday’s capture was the first time Ukraine captured a North Korean soldier alive on the battlefield.

The SBU released an image of a Russian military ID card issued in the name of another man from Tuva, Russia, and said to be carried by a captured soldier. The soldier said he obtained the document last fall in Russia, according to the SBU. He also said that some North Korean combat troops only trained with Russian troops for a week. The SBU said the other prisoner had no documents.

According to the SBU, the soldier said he had served in the North Korean army and thought he was being sent to Russia for training rather than combat.

On Sunday, Ukraine renewed its offensive on Kursk, where Ukrainian forces have been holding on to territory since a surprise incursion last summer.

The Ukrainian military said on Tuesday it had carried out a precision strike on a Russian military command post near the town of Belaya.

Despite Kiev’s rapid advance into Kursk over the summer – the first ground invasion of Russia by a foreign power since World War II – Russia ultimately succeeded in pushing back its forces. The lines had remained largely static in the weeks leading up to Ukraine’s latest actions.

In his daily speech on Monday, Zelensky said the Kursk offensive was important to prevent Russia from moving troops into Donetsk and other areas in eastern and southern Ukraine.

Although both sides are exhausted after nearly three years of war, fighting on the front lines has intensified in recent weeks. With Donald Trump set to return to the White House this month – promising to end the war in one day but not saying how – Moscow and Kiev appear to be making an 11th-hour push to annex territory and ramp up talks ahead of potential peace talks .

This story has been updated.

CNN’s Sophie Tanno, Christian Edwards, Nick Paton Walsh and Daria Tarasova-Maki Daria Tarasova-Markina contributed to this report.

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