Zelenskyy: North Korean troops pushing Russia’s war ‘beyond borders’

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says that the deployment of thousands of North Korean soldiers to Russia is pushing the war beyond its borders.

Writing on Telegram, Zelenskyy said: “There is only one conclusion — this war is internationalised and goes beyond the borders”.

Western leaders have also warned that North Korea’s involvement in a European war could raise tensions in the Indo-Pacific region.

Finland’s president has also said North Korea’s dispatch of troops to Russia represents an escalation of the Russia-Ukraine war that goes against China’s own stated position on the conflict, following talks Tuesday with the Chinese president.

“North Korean activity right now, both in terms of arms exports and especially in terms of sending troops to China, is sorry to Russia, is escalation, expansion and provocation,” Stubb told reporters in Beijing.

Zelenskyy said he spoke to South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol and told him that 3,000 North Korean soldiers are already at military bases close to the Ukrainian front line and that he expects that deployment to increase to 12,000.

At the Pentagon on Tuesday, spokesman Major General Pat Ryder said a “relatively small number” of North Korean troops are now in Russia’s Kursk region, where Russian troops have been struggling to push back a Ukrainian incursion, and a couple thousand more are heading in that direction.

South Korea, which has been in close contact with NATO, the US and the European Union about the latest developments, warned last week that it could send arms to Ukraine in retaliation for the North’s involvement.

Meanwhile, North Korea said its top diplomat is visiting Russia in another sign of their deepening relationship.

Tensions on the Korean Peninsula are at their highest point in years, with North Korea continuing a run of provocative weapons tests and South Korea and the US expanding their military drills.

It comes as Russian drones, missiles and bombs struck Kyiv and Kharkiv overnight, killing four people and wounding 15, according to local authorities.

The Russian army is also pushing hard against front-line defences in the eastern Donetsk region of Ukraine.

The Russian Defence Ministry claimed Tuesday that Russian troops captured the Donetsk town of Hirnyk and the villages of Katerynivka, and Bohoiavlenka.