South Korea’s defense ministry said Thursday that it has been reconfirmed that North Korea’s troop dispatch to Russia was “deceptive and inhumane,” after a local newspaper released an interview with a North Korean soldier captured by Ukrainian forces. 

Ministry spokesperson Jeon Ha-kyu made the remarks during a press briefing when asked about the interview in the Chosun Ilbo newspaper, released Wednesday. 

The spokesperson said the defense ministry condemns the acts of the Kim Jong-un regime and strongly urges an immediate halt to the dispatching of any additional troops. 

In the interview, the North Korean, surnamed Ri, said he was a soldier working for the Reconnaissance General Bureau, adding that he left North Korea in early October and trained in Vladivostok, Russia, before being transferred to the Kursk region in mid-December. 

Ri also said he thought he was fighting South Korean soldiers, as the officials from the North’s Ministry of State Security lied that the drone pilots were all South Koreans. 

North Korea has yet to acknowledge having dispatched troops to Russia.