Why North Korea is sending soldiers to Russia will bother China

HONG KONG — North Korean forces will begin fighting alongside Russian forces already this weekend, Ukraine said Friday – adding new urgency to a A stunning turn in the war that has alarmed the Kremlin’s enemies but can also cause headaches for his friends.

Reports confirmed this week by Washington That North Korea sends soldiers to Russia for possible battle Ukraine has raised serious concerns with the US and its allies, who say their involvement marks a major escalation in the long-running conflict and could increase security risks for North Korea’s neighbors.

It will probably also be unwelcome news Chinawhich has long been North Korea’s most important ally, but whose influence over the reclusive nuclear weapons state is being eroded by its leader Kim Jong UnThe growing relationship with President Vladimir Putin.

For Beijing, the deployment of troops from Pyongyang is the latest and most alarming sign of Moscow’s advance.

“I think it makes them very uncomfortable,” said Ian Beerder, founder and president of Eurasia Group, a consulting firm based in New York.

“If the North Koreans actually send troops to fight the Russians, then the level of Russian willingness to support North Korea, to help defend North Korea, will clearly be equivalent,” he said in an interview on Thursday to NBC News. “And that in many ways replaces China as the primary protector of North Korea.”

Ukraine says North Korean troops in Russia could join the fighting from Sunday

The US and its ally South Korea There are said to be 3,000 North Korean troops deployed in Russia, with the total expected to be 12,000.

Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky said Friday in a message on X that the first North Korean soldiers were expected to be deployed to combat zones as early as Sunday. It would be the first large-scale overseas deployment of the North Korean military since the Vietnam War.

Ukraine said on Thursday that the first North Korean troops had already been deployed to the Russian border region of Kursk, where Ukrainian forces launched an incursion in August.

Video released last week by the Ukrainian government’s Center for Strategic Communications and Information Security allegedly shows North Korean soldiers in Russia’s Far East equipped with Russian military equipment. NBC News has not independently verified the date or location of the video, which features people speaking Korean.

In addition to providing Putin a boost on the battlefield, the involvement of North Korean forces would further strengthen its partnership with Kim signed a pact in Pyongyang in June that includes a pledge of mutual defense.

Putin did not deny that North Korea was sending soldiers to Russia, initially resorting to sarcasm when asked by NBC News on Thursday, saying it was up to the two countries to decide how to implement the deal.

“We are in contact with our North Korean friends. We will see how that process develops,” he said while hosting the summit of BRICS countries in Kazan, Russia. He added that it was the US and other Western countries that had escalated the war in Ukraine.

A North Korean representative to the United Nations in New York said Monday that reports of North Korean soldiers being sent to Russia were “baseless rumors.”

South Korea said on Friday it was “deeply concerned” after the mutual defense pact was ratified a day earlier by the lower house of Russia’s parliament, with the upper house expected to follow soon.

South Korean Defense Minister Kim Yong-hyun and his American counterpart, Lloyd Austinwill hold their annual meeting in Washington next week. South Korean officials said Friday that the two men will discuss how the North Korean deployment could affect the security situation on the Korean Peninsula.

Tensions there have increased, as they have in North Korea, and will continue to do so technically at war with the Southcontinues to promote its weapons programs and make threats.

The U.S. and other countries say Moscow may provide Pyongyang with key military technology for those programs in exchange for the munitions it needs in Ukraine, including millions of artillery shells. Both North Korea and Russia deny any arms transfer.

But experts say the arrangement could make Moscow even more dependent on Pyongyang, and may be more willing to share the technologies and expertise North Korea most desires.

The participation of North Korean troops in the war in Ukraine could also lead to an even further escalation of the conflict.

South Korea is now considering upgrading its support to Ukraine from non-lethal aid to defensive and perhaps even offensive weapons. The government of Japananother U.S. ally directly threatened by North Korea’s weapons programs said Friday it was monitoring the situation “with grave concern.”

China, which borders both North Korea and Russia and has grown increasingly close with both in its efforts to challenge the US-led international order, has its own reasons to worry.

It has sought to portray itself as neutral in the war in Ukraine, putting forward a peace plan that Ukraine, the US and others say is too favorable to Russia. But China has backed Russia diplomatically and economically, and the US accuses it of supplying dual-use technology to Russia, which it denies.

Beijing is not particularly happy with North Korea’s recent behavior nor with the direction of the war in Ukraine, Beerder said.

He noted that the Chinese president Xi Jinping called for an end to the war in Ukraine in a speech at the BRICS summit this week.

“I honestly think North Korea’s action is a big part of that,” Beerder said.

When asked Thursday about the reported North Korean deployment, a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson said Beijing was not aware of the situation.

“China’s position on the Ukraine crisis has been consistent and clear, and the country hopes that all sides will work to de-escalate the situation and remain committed to a political solution,” the spokesperson, Lin Jian, said at a regular briefing in Beijing.

Bbraker, who met with the Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi and other senior Chinese leaders said when he was in Beijing last week that he sensed they were “clearly uncomfortable” with the relationship with Russia and the progress of the war in Ukraine, which began weeks after Xi and Putin. declared a partnership without borders in Beijing in February 2022.

“They said things like, ‘Well, the Kremlin told us this would happen in a few weeks,’ and it didn’t,” Beerder said. “So in other words, they kind of sold them a bill of goods.”

While the Chinese government has so far seemed largely reluctant to use its influence over Russia in Ukraine, Beerder said it was now actively considering “taking a more assertive position, perhaps after the elections being more willing to cooperate with the Americans and others to try to end the war.”

This article was originally published on NBCNews.com