BBC reported the information.Interviews with escapees and South Korean officials describe a system where North Korean men are flown to Russia’s Far East, escorted straight to construction sites by security agents, and held under tight surveillance. One worker, Jin, (names of workers quoted have been changed for safety) recalled being warned upon arrival: “The outside world is our enemy.” He said he was put to work on high-rise projects for more than 18 hours a day.All six workers interviewed described punishing routines — up at 6 a.m., building until 2 a.m., with just two days off a year — and sleep in overcrowded shipping containers or unfinished buildings. “Waking up was terrifying, realising you had to repeat the same day over again,” said Tae, who escaped last year. Another worker, Chan, said supervisors beat men caught dozing on the job: “Some people would leave their post to sleep in the day, or fall asleep standing up, but the supervisors would find them and beat them. It was truly like we were dying.”Experts say the deployment has surged despite a 2019 UN ban intended to cut off Pyongyang’s overseas labor revenue. Russian entry data show more than 13,000 North Koreans arrived in 2024, many on “student” visas that officials and researchers describe as a workaround. South Korean intelligence estimates that more than 10,000 were sent last year and that the total could eventually exceed 50,000, with some likely headed to reconstruction projects in Russian-held Ukrainian territories. In June, a senior Russian official acknowledged that 5,000 workers would be sent to rebuild the border region of Kursk.“The conditions are truly abysmal,” said Kang Dong-wan, a South Korean professor who has interviewed laborers in Russia. He said workers often toil at night with little safety equipment. Wages are largely siphoned off as “loyalty fees” to the North Korean state, with the small remainder withheld until return — tactics experts say are designed to prevent escape. Tae said learning that Central Asian crews earned far more for far less “was shattering.” “I felt like I was in a labour camp; a prison without bars,” he said.Andrei Lankov, a Seoul-based scholar of North Korea–Russia relations, said Russia’s war-driven labor crunch has made these workers a convenient fix. “Russia is suffering a severe labour shortage right now and North Koreans offer the perfect solution. They are cheap, hard-working and don't get into trouble,” he said. As controls tighten — more ideological sessions, curtailed outings — fewer are managing to flee. For Jin, who heard other crews jeer, “You are not men, just machines that can speak,” the threat of losing his pay entirely convinced him to run.“These workers will be the lasting legacy of Kim and Putin's wartime friendship,” Lankov added, predicting deployments will outlast the fighting itself.