Russian paramilitary soldiers killed in friendly fire attack

According to Ukrainian officials, Russian paramilitary soldiers were accidentally attacked and killed by North Korean troops in a recent friendly fire attack.

In a statement released on Saturday, Ukraine’s Defense Intelligence (DIU) detailed how soldiers from the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) have recently assisted Russian troops in Kursk Oblast, currently occupied by Ukrainian forces. Ukrainian officials estimate that around 11,000 DPRK troops are stationed in Russia.

“The aggressor state of Russia has begun to use DPRK soldiers in assault operations in the Kursk region, in particular, as part of the combined units of marine infantry and airborne troops of the Russian Armed Forces,” reads the statement.

“North Korean troops suffer health and irreversible losses as a result of the successful fire attack by the Ukrainian Security and Defense Forces,” the DIU added. “In particular, at one of the positions in the Kursk region, the DPRK army was effectively attacked by FPV drones.”

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A view of dragon teeth and barbed wire built to create a defensive line around Sumy, seen in Sumy, Ukraine, on November 6, 2024. (Oksana Parafeniuk for The Washington Post via Getty Images)

The DIU noted that in a recent incident, the language barrier between Russian and North Korean troops ultimately led to the deaths of eight soldiers from the Akhmat special forces unit, which is a paramilitary group in Chechnya.

“When using DPRK troops on the battlefield, the language barrier remains problematic for controlling and coordinating actions,” the statement said.

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Russian Defense Minister Andrey Belousov (L) meets with his North Korean counterpart No Kwang Chol (R) in Pyongyang, North Korea, on November 29, 2024. (Russian Ministry of Defense/Vadim Savitsky/Handout/Anadolu via Getty Images)

“Due to this problem, North Korean soldiers opened ‘friendly fire’ against the vehicles of the so-called Akhmat battalion,” the DIU added. “As a result, eight Kadyrovite soldiers were killed.”

This latest development in the Russo-Ukrainian war occurred as the Russian army continued to hit Ukraine’s power grid, taking advantage of the frigid conditions to devastate the country’s largest energy company.

This photo taken on October 18, 2023 shows North Korean soldiers waving their national flags as they welcome Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov after he landed at Pyongyang airport. (KIM WON JIN/AFP via Getty Images)

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In one of the largest mass attacks ever recorded against Ukraine’s power grid, Russian forces fired nearly 100 missiles, including cruise missiles, and 200 drones across western Ukraine on Friday. according to the Kyiv Independent.

Fox News Digital’s Caitlin McFall contributed to this report.