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North Korea has broken ground on a new memorial in Pyongyang dedicated to its soldiers killed fighting alongside Russian troops to push Ukrainian forces out of Kursk, state media reported.
The groundbreaking ceremony for the “Memorial Museum of Combat Feats” was attended by North Korea’s leader Kim Jong-un and Russia’s ambassador to North Korea Aleksandr Matsegora as well as other embassy officials.
Speaking at the event on Thursday, Kim said the memorial “is a sacred sanctuary dedicated to the immortality of true patriots,” state-run news agency KCNA reported on Friday.
It is not uncommon for North Korean state media to report on events a day after they happened.
Speaking about the operation in Kursk where Ukraine launched a surprise incursion in August last year, Kim said that the “military brotherhood” between his country and Russia would “advance non-stop,” KCNA reported.
According to South Korean assessments, North Korea has sent around 15,000 troops to Russia since last autumn and supplied large quantities of military equipment, including artillery and ballistic missiles, in support of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Seoul estimates that at least 600 North Korean soldiers have been killed fighting alongside Russian troops, with thousands more wounded.
Kim has also agreed to send thousands of military construction workers and deminers to Kursk, as Kim deepens military ties with Russia.
South Korean officials have expressed concern that North Korea could receive badly needed economic aid and advanced military technologies in exchange for its war support.
They fear that it could enhance the threat posed by Kim’s nuclear weapons programme. Experts say North Korea’s military would also obtain valuable combat experiences from the war.
Trump and Kim talks?
Meanwhile, speculation is rife that US President Donald Trump may seek to meet Kim when he attends the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting in Seoul next week.
Trump has repeatedly expressed his desire to restore diplomacy surrounding the North’s nuclear weapons programme and boasted of his relationship with Kim, calling him “a smart guy.”
Kim said last month that he has “good personal memories” of his meetings with Trump and suggested he could return to talks if the US drops “its delusional obsession with denuclearisation” of North Korea.
The last time Trump visited South Korea in 2019 he made a surprise trip to the border, crossed into North Korea and held talks with Kim in the border village of Panmunjom.
Since then, Kim has sharply accelerated the pace of weapons tests, as high-stakes nuclear diplomacy with Trump fell apart that same year due to wrangling over US-led sanctions.