North Korea reportedly sent a significant number of illegal workers to Russia last year.

According to South Korea's National Intelligence Service on Sunday, North Korea dispatched thousands of workers to construction sites across Russia in 2024.

The dispatch comes amid a shortage of construction workers in Russia, whose young population was mobilized for its prolonged war against Ukraine.

North Korea's dispatch of workers overseas violates United Nations Security Council Resolution 2375, which prohibits granting employment permits to North Korean workers.

Radio Free Asia recently reported that the number of North Koreans entering Russia in 2024 rose nearly 12 times from the previous year to surpass 13-thousand, with over 78-hundred of them saying they visited Russia for "education" purposes.

North Korea and Russia are suspected to be using a form of visa laundering to disguise the North's labor dispatches as academic enrollment.