New images released by North Korean state media on Friday showed leader Kim Jong Un kneeling before portraits of soldiers killed fighting for Russia against Ukraine, as well as hugging an emotional survivor of the conflict.
The images of an elaborate ceremony showed an overcome Kim presenting medals, placing them beside portraits of the fallen and consoling the returned soldiers, as Pyongyang’s leadership hailed the soldiers as “heroes” who sacrificed their youth and lives.
South Korean and Western intelligence agencies have said the North sent over 10,000 soldiers to Russia in 2024 — primarily to the Kursk region — along with artillery shells, missiles and long-range rocket systems.
Around 600 North Korean soldiers have been killed and thousands more wounded fighting for Russia, Seoul has said.
At the ceremony held at the Workers’ Party headquarters in Pyongyang, portraits of the fallen soldiers, along with their names, were displayed on stage, the images showed.
There, Kim praised the “admirable” troops “who returned home with great honour” after enduring the “hail of bullets and bombs of the life-and-death war in the foreign country”, Pyongyang’s official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported.
In one of the images released by KCNA, an emotional Kim was seen embracing a returned solider who appeared overwhelmed, burying his face in the leader’s chest during the ceremony.
The leader was also seen kneeling before a portrait of a fallen soldier to pay his respects, and placing medals and flowers beside the images of the dead.
Kim personally awarded the title of “DPRK (North Korea) hero”, to commanding officers who fought in overseas operations and “performed distinguished feats”, KCNA said.
It added that he also laid a flower at the memorial wall and met with bereaved families to console them and share “the pain of loss”.
North Korea only confirmed it had deployed troops to support Russia’s war in Ukraine in April, and admitted that its soldiers had been killed in combat.
US President Donald Trump has held high-profile talks with Russian and Ukrainian leaders in recent days in a bid to end the conflict, but there has been little tangible progress since then.
Russian President Vladimir Putin hailed North Korean troops sent to fight in Ukraine as “heroic” in a letter to Kim, Pyongyang’s state media said last week.
Washington has said there is evidence that Russia is stepping up support for North Korea, including providing help on advanced space and satellite technology, in return for its assistance in fighting Ukraine.
Analysts say satellite launchers and ICBMs share much of the same underlying technology.
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