North Korea has not announced that it will dispatch troops to support Russia’s war against Ukraine within a month, despite multiple news reports that have made this claim this week.

Picking up on comments made during a U.S. government briefing, the British tabloid Daily Express, Ukrainian website Kyiv Post and other outlets have reported as fact that Pyongyang stated it would send engineers to Russian-occupied Donetsk to rebuild the war-torn city. 

The reports come after Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong Un signed a mutual defense treaty last week and as North Korea has allegedly been sending artillery and ballistic missiles to Russia in support of its invasion.

While this possibility cannot be ruled out completely, neither North Korea nor Russia has made any such announcements so far. 

The unconfirmed rumors of deployment instead spread through a combination of anonymized single-source reports and multiple levels of misinterpretation as those reports spread globally, a familiar pattern for DPRK-related misinformation.

HOW THE RUMORS EVOLVED

Speculation about North Korea’s alleged move to directly enter the Ukraine conflict originated in a report by South Korean broadcaster TV Chosun last Friday, which cited an anonymous ROK government official’s claim that Pyongyang plans to dispatch military engineers to aid construction efforts in the Russian-controlled Donetsk region.

The official reportedly claimed that North Korea will deploy an elite Korean People’s Army engineering corps as early as next month, citing its past efforts to raise foreign currency under the guise of construction firms such as the U.S.-sanctioned “Namgang Construction.”

Reuters subsequently mentioned the TV Chosun claims as background information in a report about a statement by a DPRK military official condemning Washington for allowing Ukraine to use U.S.-made weapons to carry out counterstrikes against Russia-based targets.

In the statement released through the official Korean Central News Agency on Monday, Central Military Commission Vice-Chairperson Pak Jong Chon affirmed North Korea’s support for Russian efforts against what he described as a U.S.-backed “proxy war” in Ukraine, but did not say Pyongyang would dispatch troops.

However, during a press briefing on Tuesday, a reporter asked Pentagon spokesperson Maj. Gen. Pat Ruder a question that linked the rumored deployment of engineers to Pak’s statement, framing it as a confirmed announcement rather than unverified speculation. 

“North Korea’s Central Military Commission announced that North Korea would join forces with the Russian military. And as part of the North Korea and Russia military alliance, the North Korean Army engineer unit would be dispatched to Donetsk, Ukraine, which remains occupied by Russia,” the journalist said when asking for the Pentagon’s take on the matter.

Ryder appeared unaware of such speculation, but replied that it would be worth keeping an eye on such developments, stating that any North Korean troops deployed to Ukraine would simply serve as “cannon fodder in an illegal war.”

The same journalist repeated the question during a State Department press briefing on Wednesday, but spokesperson Matthew Miller said he had not seen any such reports and added that the U.S. remains opposed to potential Russia-DPRK military cooperation in “occupied Ukrainian territory.”

However, by this time, the British tabloid Daily Express and some influential social media accounts had already picked up Ryder’s “cannon fodder” comments the previous day and repeated the incorrect description of the deployment claims as an official North Korean announcement.

While some news outlets cited the TV Chosun claims as the story gathered steam, some others such as Ukraine’s Kyiv Post and Kyiv Independent soon ran stories referencing the Daily Express article’s claims without verifying the source of the rumors.

However, for now, that is all these reports are — rumors.

As Russia and North Korea ramp up military cooperation, the possibility of DPRK troops joining the war cannot be ruled out. Back in 2022, the two sides even discussed the possibility of North Korea sending workers to Russia-controlled areas of eastern Ukraine to help rebuild after the war.

But so far, North Korea has not officially announced plans to dispatch engineers or other military personnel to support Moscow’s war efforts.

Edited by Bryan Betts