ISW: Ukrainian military denies North Korean presence in Kharkiv Oblast

Ukrainian military officials denied reports of North Korean personnel operating in Kharkiv Oblast on 22 November, amid new claims of North Korean technical advisers’ presence in Russian-occupied Mariupol, ISW says.

North Korea has sustained Russian artillery during the Russo-Ukrainian war by supplying millions of artillery shells. Additionally, Pyongyang has provided missiles to Russia and reportedly deployed 11,000 North Korean soldiers to Russia’s Kursk Oblast to fight against Ukraine.

According to CNN, citing an anonymous Ukrainian “security source,” North Korean technical advisers have arrived in Mariupol, where they are conducting support operations while wearing Russian military uniforms. The source told CNN that these personnel remain separated from Russian units, maintaining their own quarters, food supplies, and entertainment facilities.

Additionally, Yevhen Romanov, a spokesperson for the Ukrainian military’s Kharkiv Operational-Tactical Command (OTU Kharkiv), told CNN that intercepted communications suggest North Korean troops are in Kharkiv Oblast, preparing for assault operations as weather conditions worsen.

OTU Kharkiv explicitly refuted claims about North Korean presence in Kharkiv Oblast, stating that the person cited in earlier reports “is not an official spokesperson for the Kharkiv Group of Forces and commented on the situation outside of their responsibilities.“

CNN identified Romanov as “a spokesperson for a union of military units in Kharkiv,” while in Ukrainian press, he had been cited as an OTU Kharkiv spokesman.

Additionally, Nazariy Kishak, commander of a consolidated unit of the 153rd Separate Mechanized Brigade, told Ukrainian media that North Korean troops were “already” in Kharkiv Oblast.

“We can see that there are already soldiers from D​PRK in our direction. I cannot disclose details, but I observe that they are dividing into units and forming small concentrations on the front line,” Kishak said, according to TSN, adding that he believes that the North Koreans are waiting for worsening weather conditions to conduct assault operations.

Earlier, unofficial sources claimed that a Ukrainian missile strike in Russia’s Kursk Oblast killed a local Russian commander, Lieutenant General Valery Solodchuk, and injured an unnamed North Korean general.

The Ukrainian security source also told CNN that recent Ukrainian missile strikes inside Russia had targeted a senior North Korean general, though the commander’s fate remains unclear.

Reuters reported on 23 November that a significant portion of the 11,000 North Korean troops stationed in Kursk Oblast are still completing their military training.

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