North Korean soldiers have been captured in Ukraine (Image: Getty)
have reportedly been told to kill troops so they are not captured by , an expert has said.
has also claimed that Kim Jong Un’s soldiers have been told to end their own lives lest they are taken as prisoners of war.
North Korea has sent men to fight for as ‘s army seeks to defend key areas.
The said on Saturday that two wounded North Korean soldiers had been captured as prisoners of war by troops in ‘s Kursk Oblast.
South Korea has reported that around 300 North Korean soldiers have been killed and 2,700 wounded while fighting.
Now, an expert has said that soldiers have been commanded to slay them before they fall into Ukrainian hands.
Anton Shekhovtsov, author and visiting professor at Central European University (CEU) in Vienna, said on X: Capturing POWs has proven challenging as North Koreans and Russians alike are apparently instructed to kill wounded NK soldiers to prevent them from falling into Ukrainian hands.
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Ukraine claims to have captured North Korean soldiers (Image: Getty)
Ukraine announced the capture of two North Korean soldiers at the weekend (Image: Getty)
“Yet recently Ukrainians have successfully captured two NK soldiers alive.
“Both individuals carried Russian military service cards alleging they were born in the Tuva Republic, a region included in the Russian Federation.
“Russian non-regime media also report that the Russian authorities transferred identities of actual Tuvans to drafted NK soldiers
“The choice of Tuva is understandable: native Tuvans bear a physical resemblance to North Koreans.”
He added: By the way, ’s former Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu is himself of Tuvan origin.
“The fact that the captured NK soldiers’ documents claimed Tuva as their birthplace corroborates earlier findings.
“Russian service cards recovered from the killed NK soldiers similarly falsely listed the Tuva Republic as their place of birth
“Yet another particularly interesting discovery was a diary found on one killed NK soldier. Ukrainian Special Operations Forces translated a number of pages from that diary, which the former owner had regularly updated, and one part was especially revealing for me.”
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Ukraine officials say the captured troops were ‘provided with all the necessary medical care’ (Image: Getty)
The Ukrainian intelligence service said in a statement that the North Korean prisoners captured on January 9 were “provided with all the necessary medical care as stipulated by the Geneva Convention” and taken to Kyiv.
Officials added: “They are being held in appropriate conditions that meet the requirements of international law.”
A South Korean lawmaker said on Monday that North Korean soldiers have been told by Pyongyang to kill themselves rather than be captured alive.
“Memos found on soldiers who died indicate that the North Korean authorities pressured them to commit suicide or self-detonate before capture,” parliamentarian Lee Seong-kweun told reporters, citing information from the National Intelligence Service, and report.