North Korea has agreed to send thousands of additional construction workers and engineers to Russia in the latest indication of deepening military cooperation between Moscow and Pyongyang. The plans were announced on June 17 following a meeting between North Korean leader Kim Jong-un and Sergei Shoigu, the former Russian Defense Minister who now serves as secretary of the country’s Security Council.
According to Shoigu, North Korea will send two brigades of “military construction workers” totaling five thousand men, along with a further one thousand combat engineers. They will reportedly conduct demining operations and help repair war damage in Russia’s Kursk region, which borders Ukraine and witnessed months of heavy fighting following a Ukrainian incursion in August 2024.
This is the latest step in an ambitious defense sector partnership between the two countries that has taken shape over the past three years. Since the early months of Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022, North Korea has provided the Kremlin with extensive military supplies. More recently, this cooperation has expanded further with Pyongyang sending thousands of soldiers to participate directly in the war against Ukraine. Russia and North Korea signed a strategic partnership treaty in summer 2024.
Voice of Ukraine 