Military cooperation between Russia and North Korea takes a new step. According to Ukrainian intelligence, Moscow is preparing to receive some 12,000 North Korean workers before the end of the year. Its destination would be a Shahed kamikaze drone factory installed in the Russian region of Tatarstana key piece in the Kremlin’s arms production strategy.
The Ukrainian GUR assures that the preparations were completed at the end of October in a meeting held at the Russian Foreign Ministry. Officials from Moscow and representatives of Jihyang Technology Trade Company, the North Korean state company in charge of recruiting personnel for jobs abroad, participated in it.
The intelligence services claim to even know the conditions of the contract: workers would be paid $2.5 per hour and they would face days of at least 12 hours a day. A scheme reminiscent of other North Korean labor programs abroad, highly criticized by human rights organizations for generating direct income for the Kim Jong-un regime.
The massive sending of workers adds to the strengthening of the alliance between Moscow and Pyongyang since the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022. US and Ukrainian intelligence maintain that North Korea has already supplied Russia with ballistic missiles and large quantities of ammunition in recent months.
Furthermore, Pyongyang would have sent some 10,000 soldiers last year to reinforce Russian forces on the front, according to the same sources. Although both countries officially deny this type of direct military cooperation, the accumulated evidence points to an increasingly deep relationship.
The incorporation of thousands of North Korean workers into the Russian military industry would accelerate the production of Shahed drones, used intensively in attacks against Ukraine. Its manufacturing, Until now dependent on cooperation with Iran, it is one of the Kremlin’s priorities.
Ukraine interprets this move as a sign that Moscow seeks to ensure a flow of cheap and controlled labor to sustain its war machine. And he warns that this new phase of collaboration could further strengthen North Korea’s role as Russia’s strategic ally in the war.
