Captured North Korean war prisoners in Ukraine ask to be brought to South Korea

Two North Korean prisoners of war in Ukraine, captured while fighting for Russia and detained since early 2025, have pleaded with a visiting documentary producer to bring them to South Korea, an activist said Friday.

Jang Se-yul, head of a North Korean defectors' group in South Korea, disclosed the meeting between two North Korean captives in their 20s and a South Korean documentary producer Tuesday at a prisoner camp near Kyiv, Ukraine, where they are currently held.

The North Korean soldiers first came to media attention when Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky wrote online in January that they had been captured by Ukrainian forces in Russia's western Kursk region while in battle.

"Please bring [us] to South Korea," Jang quoted them as telling the producer, weeping.

Both of them expressed a desire to go to South Korea, Jang suggested, a change from February, when only one of them had expressed such an intent during a meeting with South Korean lawmaker Yu Yong-weon.

The soldier had expressed a desire to have a home and start a family in the South, according to Yu. Sending the soldiers back to the North would be a "death sentence," the lawmaker said.

Provided photos showed that the jaw wound sustained by one of them at the time of capture was now healed, though it had left some bone distortion. Otherwise, they appeared to be in a relatively healthy state.

Hand-drawn portraits of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un were hung on the bed of one of them.

They asked for medicine for eye diseases, knitted clothes, trousers, cigarettes, pens and books via the producer, Jang said, also conveying Ukrainian officials' remarks that they were in a state of psychological instability and had attempted to harm themselves.

South Korea has notified the Ukrainian government of its intent to receive the North Korean captives if their intentions were confirmed, but no progress appears to be underway on their transfer. 

North Korea has deployed 15,000 troops to fight alongside Russia in its war with Ukraine since October last year, as the two states forge increasingly close military ties.

Some 600 North Korean soldiers are believed to have been killed while fighting for Russia, and more than 4,000 North Korean troops have also been injured, according to South Korea's spy agency.

Kim has touted the troops as "heroes" who were assigned to carry out the "most important duty."

BY KIM JU-YEON, YONHAP [[email protected]]