The revived North Korea–Russia partnership has catalysed a ‘fundamental change’ in both the geopolitical landscape of northeast Asia and the broader international order. In late October, speculation that North Korea would send troops to Russian-occupied territories of Ukraine – which had emerged following the signing of the comprehensive strategic partnership treaty in June 2024 – was confirmed, when the South Korean and Ukrainian intelligence services announced that more than 12,000 North Korean troops were to be deployed to Russia, initially in the Kursk region, where Ukrainian troops had made incursions from August 2024. This North Korean deployment, in wanton violation of sanctions, only emphasized the rapidly growing extent of cooperation between Pyongyang and Moscow, even if the impact of North Korean personnel – whether front-line soldiers or weapons technicians – on Russia’s overall war strategy is likely to be minimal.
By undermining the UN Security Council as a central institution of global security, North Korea–Russia cooperation has facilitated an increase in the sanctions-violating activities on the part of both states, while the international community remains increasingly unable to compel North Korea to denuclearize.
Yet the threats posed by North Korea’s turn to Russia – to both regional and global security – are likely to extend beyond any future conclusion of the Ukraine war. By undermining the UN Security Council as a central institution of global security, North Korea–Russia cooperation has facilitated an increase in the sanctions-violating activities on the part of both states, while the international community remains increasingly unable to compel North Korea to denuclearize.
North Korea’s turn to Russia is of grave concern for policymakers both in northeast Asia and the West, since it amplifies the military threat emanating from the Kim Jong Un regime. First, Pyongyang continues to accelerate its vertical proliferation of nuclear weapons and delivery systems, with Kim Jong Un pledging to increase the size of his nuclear arsenal at an ‘exponential’ rate, and to develop tactical nuclear weapons to combat the ‘serious nuclear threat’ posed by the US. Second, the unknown extent and duration of military cooperation with Russia has elevated the risk of North Korea acquiring new and advanced military and missile technologies, which it could potentially use to provoke South Korea and the US, both in the short and long term.
While North Korea is unlikely to use nuclear weapons in any conflict – for fear of the response, which would lead to the destruction of the Kim regime – it may, as in the past, pursue a policy of heightened brinkmanship, which will pose clear security challenges, most notably to Japan and South Korea. Even though North Korea’s past behaviour has exhibited a tendency to escalate provocations towards its adversaries of the US and South Korea during US election years, North Korea has significantly increased its belligerent behaviour towards the South in 2024. For example, in August, Kim Jong Un announced that North Korea had deployed ‘tactical ballistic missile launchers’ to its front-line troops along the inter-Korean border. A month later, Kim unveiled North Korea’s largest ever transporter-erector launch vehicle, designed to transport and launch surface-to-air and surface-to-surface missiles. North Korean missile launches frequently land in waters between Japan and the Korean peninsula, while North Korea continues to carry out other acts of belligerence against its neighbours. For example, Pyongyang’s ongoing launches of balloons carrying excrement and refuse across the Korean border since May 2024 suggest that it has no intention of reining in its provocations.
The intensified cooperation between North Korea and Russia also elevates the risk for South Korea and its partners of being placed in an increasingly precarious position in their own foreign relations, in terms of both economic and military security. Even prior to the Ukraine war, Seoul has always striven to maintain its alliance with Washington without compromising its economic relations with Beijing and Moscow. Nevertheless, China’s ongoing economic coercion and push for ‘self-reliance’ has already led to South Korea seeking to ‘de-risk’ its trade, not least by diversifying imports away from China. For example, in December 2023, South Korean exports to the US exceeded those to China for the first time in nearly 20 years, in what could be seen, at least in part, as a reaction to China’s growing economic coercion.
Thus, North Korea’s burgeoning relationship with Russia has caused South Korea to align itself more concertedly with the US, raising the possibility of greater tensions over trade with China and Russia. This potential has not gone unnoticed by China. Indeed, at a trilateral meeting between China, Japan and South Korea in May 2024, Chinese premier Li Qiang warned South Korea not to ‘turn economic and trade issues into political games or security matters’.
