When Russia and North Korea ratified a mutual defence treaty in 2024, they formalised an alliance that now extends into Russian workplaces, according to a new investigation.
Global Rights Compliance said North Korean workers have been brought into Russia on student visas, enrolled at colleges they do not attend and then assigned to factory employers. The organisation’s investigation, released on Thursday, 29 October, found placements at sites supporting Moscow’s war against Ukraine, including factories making military supplies.
The arrangement centres on KNDR.su, a labour-brokering platform operated by the Russian businessman Vladimir Sokolov, who also runs the Black Horse group of companies. The platform advertises North Korean workers to employers in agriculture, construction, industry and IT, charging 100,000-150,000 roubles ($1,240-$1,860) for each placement.
Ruslan Zhukov, the operations director of Sokolov’s operations, told Global Rights Compliance investigators posing as prospective employers that the workers were enrolled in colleges in order to avoid labour law, the organisation said. He described a schedule of 12 hours a day, six days a week.
The practice is prohibited under a 2017 UN Security Council resolution that bars member states from hosting North Korean workers. The resolution sought to cut off money for Pyongyang’s nuclear weapons and missile programmes.
Russia granted more than 36,000 visas to North Koreans in 2025, four times the previous year’s number. Almost all were officially issued for education.
Global Rights Compliance said Sokolov had publicised at least two work sites connected to Moscow’s military-industrial complex. Some North Korean workers were assigned to factories producing supplies for the military, including military food rations.
Lara Strangways, Global Rights Compliance’s head of business and human rights, said the network served both governments: workers supported Russian industry, including sites linked to the war in Ukraine, while the proceeds helped fund North Korea’s military programme.
The investigation documented 12-hour shifts, as few as two days off a month and threats of punishment against workers or their families if they tried to escape.
An earlier Global Rights Compliance investigation, published in March, drew on interviews with 21 workers in three Russian cities. It recorded shifts of up to 16 hours, confiscated passports, physical abuse and compulsory payments to the North Korean government. Some workers said they earned as little as $10 per month.
Zhukov denied the allegations, calling them “false, fabricated, and categorically rejected in their entirety.” He said the workers were exclusively students in Russia under an intergovernmental agreement on the exchange of experience.
An 11-country team that monitors sanctions enforcement estimated that between 35,600 and 101,280 North Korean workers were overseas in 2025, generating $450m-$800m for Pyongyang. Global Rights Compliance said the Russian network was part of a state-sponsored labour programme that contributes to North Korea’s ballistic missile development.
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