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South Korea says Ukraine breached confidentiality agreement over North Korean POW transfer

28 September 2026 05:31 (UTC +04:00)

South Korea says Ukraine breached a confidentiality agreement by publicly disclosing the transfer of two North Korean prisoners of war to Seoul, Reuters reports.

The South Korean Presidential Office expressed “deep regret” over Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s disclosure of the transfer, saying the two countries had agreed that the information would not be made public.

Zelenskyy announced during his address to the UN General Assembly that Ukraine had transferred two captured North Korean soldiers to South Korea.

The soldiers had been captured while fighting alongside Russian forces against Ukraine before being sent to South Korea.

The two sides have, however, given conflicting accounts over whether a confidentiality agreement existed.

Son Gi-hong, the South Korean president’s senior secretary for public relations, said Seoul also “deeply regretted” Ukraine’s subsequent statement denying the existence of an agreement not to disclose the transfer.

The South Korean official rejected Kyiv’s account, saying Ukraine’s assertion that no such confidentiality agreement had been reached was “not true.”

Ukraine, for its part, maintains that there was no agreement requiring the information about the transfer to remain confidential.