North Korea appears to have sent more troops to Russia to back its war against Ukraine, Seoul says

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — South Korea’s spy agency said Thursday that North Korea appears to have sent additional troops to Russia, after its soldiers deployed on the Russian-Ukraine fronts suffered heavy casualties.

The National Intelligence Service said in a brief statement it was trying to determine exactly how many more troops North Korea has deployed to Russia.

The NIS also assessed that North Korean troops were redeployed at fronts in Russia’s Kursk region in the first week of February, following a reported temporary withdrawal from the area. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, in an address on Feb. 7, confirmed a new Ukrainian offensive in Kursk and said North Korean troops were fighting alongside Russian forces there.

North Korea has been supplying a vast amount of conventional weapons to Russia, and last fall it sent about 10,000-12,000 troops to Russia as well, according to U.S., South Korean and Ukraine intelligence officials. North Korean soldiers are highly disciplined and well trained, but observers say they’ve become easy targets for drone and artillery attacks on Russian-Ukraine battlefields due to their lack of combat experience and unfamiliarity with the terrain.

In January, the NIS said about 300 North Korean soldiers had died and another 2,700 had been injured. Zelenskyy earlier put the number of killed or wounded North Koreans at 4,000, though U.S. estimates were lower at around 1,200.

Earlier Thursday, South Korea’s JoongAng Ilbo newspaper, citing unidentified sources, reported that an additional 1,000-3,000 North Korean soldiers were deployed to Kursk between January and February.

South Korea, the U.S. and their partners worry that Russia could reward North Korea by transferring high-tech weapons technologies that can sharply enhance its nuclear weapons program. North Korea is expected to receive economic and other assistance from Russia as well.

During talks in Saudi Arabia last week, Russia and the U.S. agreed to start working toward ending the war and improving their diplomatic and economic ties. Ukrainian officials weren’t present at the talks. That marked an extraordinary shift in U.S. foreign policy under President Donald Trump and a clear departure from U.S.-led efforts to isolate Russia over its war in Ukraine.

Observers say North Korean leader Kim Jong Un could send more troops to Russia to win further Russian assistance before the war ends.

This story has been edited to reflect that the NIS statement was released on Thursday, not Wednesday.

FILE - A North Korean flag flutters in the wind atop a 160-meter tower in North Korea's village Gijungdong as seen from the Taesungdong freedom village inside the demilitarized zone in Paju, South Korea on April 24, 2018. (AP Photo/Lee Jin-man, File)

FILE - A TV screen at Seoul Railway Station in South Korea, on Oct. 21, 2024, shows an image of soldiers believed to be from North Korea standing in line to receive supplies from Russia. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon, File)

VIENNA (AP) — Police in eastern Austria say a 39-year-old suspect has been arrested after rat poison turned up in some HiPP baby food jars on supermarket shelves in central Europe.

HiPP, which recalled some of its baby food jars in Austria, Slovakia and the Czech Republic after the case came to light last month, said in a statement Saturday it was “greatly relieved” by the arrest, and would provide further updates as verified details come in.

The Burgenland State Criminal Police Office, under the direction of prosecutors, said a probe was launched after poison turned up in a baby food jar purchased at a supermarket in the city of Eisenstadt on April 18.

It said the suspect was being questioned, and that no further details would be immediately provided. The Burgenland public prosecutor’s office has announced an investigation into suspected “intentional endangerment of the public.”

In an email to The Associated Press on Sunday, the Burgenland police office said the suspect was arrested in Salzburg state, to the west.

The Austrian Press Agency reported that an expert report on the toxicity of the poison was pending. A total of five tampered baby food jars were seized before they could be consumed, APA reported.

Authorities said previously they believe the tampering occurred in 190-gram (6.7-ounce) jars of baby food made with carrots and potatoes for 5-month-olds that were sold from SPAR supermarkets in Austria.

HiPP responded by recalling all of its baby food jars sold at SPAR supermarkets — which include SPAR, EUROSPAR, INTERSPAR and Maximarkt stores — in Austria as a precaution. Vendors in Slovakia and the Czech Republic also removed all of the brand’s baby jars from sale.

The company said the recall was not due to any product or quality defect on its part, and said the jars left its facility in “perfect condition.”

Police said a customer at the time of the discovery had reported that a jar appeared to have been tampered with, but no one had consumed the baby food.

Pfaffenhofen, Germany-based HiPP said it has been a “victim of extortion,” adding that an unspecified “blackmailer” sent a message to a shared mailbox in the case, prompting it to immediately inform police.

A view of HIPP baby food on a shelf, in Ceske Budejovice, Czech Republic, Sunday, April 19, 2026. (AP Photo/Stanislav Hodina)