Surrendering North Korean soldier refuses to drop sausages at gunpoint

A surrendered North Korean soldier risked his life by refusing to drop his sausage at gunpoint, according to Ukrainian paratroopers who captured him.

A detailed video report, released by Ukrainian special forces, describes how the soldier refused to put down his food, while one of his compatriots attempted suicide by hitting himself against a pillar.

They then asked to watch Korean romance films, the Ukrainians said.

“He was lying there, his head and one arm injured. He had a grenade, a knife and a sausage on him,” one of the soldiers of Ukraine’s 95th air assault brigade said in an interview published Tuesday.

“I asked him to drop everything, but he refused to drop the sausage because it was food, so we let him keep it.”

The brigade captured the two North Koreans alive on January 11 – the first of Pyongyang’s troops to be brought back to kyiv for questioning.

After a failed North Korean assault on Ukrainian positions, paratroopers said they found the first soldier lying in a trench, wounded in the head and arm.

“It is no secret that North Korean soldiers do not surrender to be captured, they are ready to commit suicide just to avoid being captured by Ukrainian soldiers,” the press service of the brigade in a message accompanying the video interview, published on Telegram on Tuesday.

Credit: Telegram/ua_dshv

North Korea deployed 12,000 troops to its Russian ally in late October to help Moscow expel kyiv’s troops from the Kursk border region after Ukraine’s surprise incursion in August.

Neither Moscow nor Pyongyang – who signed a “mutual military assistance” agreement last June – have confirmed North Korea’s participation in the war.

Some 4,000 of Kim Jong-un’s troops have been killed or wounded, Volodymyr Zelensky said earlier this month. This figure is likely to be higher after recent reports of battlefield casualties.

Numerous reports also suggest that North Korean troops are under standing orders not to surrender. Some blew themselves up with grenades, while others were killed by their own comrades to prevent capture.

Soldiers from the 95th Brigade said that while the second soldier was being extracted, he began to panic and had to be dragged out of the trench.

“We were escorting him to the road where there were concrete pillars… and suddenly he ran and hit his head on the pillar,” said a paratrooper with the call sign d called “Ded” (grandfather), adding that the man knocked himself out with a punch. the impact.

Another Ukrainian soldier, Pavlo, later described how, after receiving food and medical treatment, “he calmed down.”

“Later, he even asked to play romance films in Korean for her,” Pavlo added.

His comrade Serhiy also mentioned the North Korean troops’ inferior tactics on the battlefield, comparing them to those used by the Russians early in the war.

“They are trying to crush us with numbers. There is no particular tactic,” he said.

“They fight like the Soviet army. They only retreated at the very last critical moment, when our reinforcement group arrived, and we outnumbered them. At that time, they already had injuries and deaths,” Serhiy explained.

Military analysts say North Korean soldiers have not been trained in modern warfare and are used as cannon fodder by their Russian allies, often sent into the open countryside in “human wave” attacks.

Ukrainian commanders also say they are grappling with an unfamiliar battlefield environment, including an inability to counter drone attacks, and using outdated weapons.

The two North Korean prisoners of war were taken to kyiv for questioning, with the help of South Korea’s intelligence agency. They said they were told they were being sent to Russia for training and not to fight in the war and were issued fake Russian military ID cards.

Mr. Zelensky offered them earlier this month to Pyongyang in exchange for Ukrainian prisoners of war held in Russia. He added that there would “undoubtedly be more” soldiers captured by kyiv in the future.

So far, Pyongyang’s troops appear to be limited to infantry roles in Kursk, where Ukraine invaded this summer to gain a foothold in Russia. kyiv is believed to still control 300 square miles after losing 40 percent of the territory it once controlled.

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