North Korean troops reportedly pulled back from Russia-Ukraine front line

Al Jazeera:

North Korean troops sent to support Russia’s invasion of Ukraine have been pulled off the front lines after suffering major casualties, according to reports.

The roughly 10,000 soldiers that Pyongyang is believed to have sent to fight alongside Russian forces have been absent from the front line for several weeks, South Korea’s Yonhap news agency reported on Tuesday. The report supports claims from Ukraine and US media on the withdrawal of the troops, whose arrival raised fears that the war in Ukraine could escalate.

South Korea’s National Intelligence Service (NIS) told AFP news agency that the North Korean units have halted combat operations in Russia’s Kursk region “since mid-January”.

“One reason for this may be the occurrence of many casualties, but the exact details are still being monitored,” said the spy agency.

A Ukrainian military analysis said on Friday that it believed the North Korean soldiers had been pulled back after suffering heavy losses.

Ukraine has previously reported that it had captured or killed numerous North Korean units in Kursk, where it launched a shock cross-border offensive in August.

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy published footage of interrogations with what he said were captured North Korean prisoners.

In mid-January, the NIS estimated that about 300 North Korean soldiers had been killed and a further 2,700 soldiers injured in fighting around the region.

The North Korean deployment to Kursk, which neither Pyongyang nor Moscow have officially acknowledged, was supposed to reinforce Russia’s army and help expel Ukraine’s troops. But nearly six months on, Ukraine still holds significant swaths of territory.

Seoul has previously said that due to the losses suffered by its forces, Pyongyang was preparing an additional deployment.