An intercepted phone call released by the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) on Dec. 18 suggests North Korean troops are suffering hundreds of casualties fighting for Russia in Kursk Oblast.
In the call, a nurse at a Moscow hospital tells her husband, a soldier fighting in Kursk Oblast, that wounded fighters are being brought in by the trainload.
“Yesterday there was a train with about 100 people. Today there are 120 — that’s already (about) 200,” she says.
“How many more are there? God only knows,” she adds.
She also claims that wards are being emptied to make way for the North Korean wounded, and hospital staff have trouble communicating with them and are not allowed to speak to them in English.
“Are they elite, or what, these Koreans? We are freeing up certain wards for them,” she says.
The Kyiv Independent could not verify the veracity or contents of the call, but the claims made are in line with recent Western estimates of North Korean losses.
A couple hundred North Korean troops have been killed or wounded fighting in Russia’s Kursk Oblast against Ukraine, the Associated Press (AP) reported on Dec. 17, citing a senior U.S. military official.
The official did not give an exact figure but said the high casualty rate was in part due to the soldiers’ lack of battle experience.
Russia has reportedly deployed over 10,000 North Korean troops to help oust Ukrainian troops fighting in Kursk Oblast since early August.
The full extent of North Korean losses is hard to ascertain, as President Volodymyr Zelensky said Russia is trying to hide the casualties.
Ukraine’s  Special Operation Forces said that they had killed 50 North Korean soldiers in Kursk Oblast in three days and injured 47 more.
Despite the losses within Russian and North Korean ranks, the Ukrainian soldiers fighting in Kursk Oblast seem to be increasingly on the back foot, facing a Russian advantage in manpower and equipment.
Commander-in-Chief Oleksandr Syrskyi said on Dec. 17 that Russian and North Korean forces are carrying out an intensive offensive in Kursk Oblast for the third day in a row.
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