NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte said on Monday that he could confirm North Korean troops have been sent to Russia and deployed to the Kursk region, describing the move as a sign of desperation in Moscow.
“The deepening military cooperation between Russia and North Korea is a threat to both Indo-Pacific and Euro-Atlantic security,” Rutte told reporters after NATO officials and diplomats received a briefing from a South Korean delegation.
Rutte described the development as a “significant escalation” and urged Moscow and Pyongyang to cease their collaboration.
He also called the deployment of North Korean forces “a sign of Putin’s growing desperation” after the Pentagon said 600,000 Russian troops had been killed or injured in Ukraine.
The prospect of Pyonyang’s troops fighting Ukrainian soldiers has fueled concerns of the Ukraine-Russia war escalating, given that North Korea would be the first third country to join the conflict.
Ukraine launched an incursion into the southeastern Russian Kursk region in August in a bid to force Moscow to reallocate troops from Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region.
