CCP Funding North Korean Military Aid in Russia, Insider Alleges

Russian President Vladimir Putin talks to the media after attending a meeting of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) in Astana, Kazakhstan, on Nov. 28, 2024. Mikhail Tereshchenko/AFP/Getty Images

SYDNEY—The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has been bankrolling North Korea’s military aid to Russia, according to insider information obtained by an Australia-based high-profile Chinese dissident.

Yuan Hongbing, a former law professor at China’s prestigious Peking University, obtained the information from members of the so-called “second-generation red”—children of senior CCP officials who established the communist regime in China—some of whom are attempting to challenge Chinese leader Xi Jinping, he told The Epoch Times on Dec. 4.

While teaching at Peking University, the Harvard of China, Yuan had access to the top echelon of the CCP, and among his “drinking buddies” was Xi, who had not yet risen to power at the time.

Yuan said he had recently obtained a report in which the CCP’s top military advisors outlined plans for what the party should do in a second Trump administration.

On Oct. 13, the United States accused North Korea of sending more than 1,000 containers of weapons and munitions to Russia.

A week later, Ukraine and South Korea alleged that Pyongyang had deployed troops to Russia. The United States later corroborated the claim, saying North Korea had sent more than 10,000 soldiers, and many had begun fighting against Ukrainian troops alongside Russian forces.

On Nov. 19, Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told the European Parliament the size of North Korean troops in Russia “may grow to 100,000.”

Moscow and Pyongyang dismissed the allegations in October, while Beijing said it didn’t have any information and maintained that China hasn’t taken a side in the war.

According to Yuan, North Korea sent weapons and troops to Russia, and did so with the CCP’s active support.

“The cost for logistics and equipment for the 100,000 special forces are funded by the CCP,” which also “continuously supplied weapons to Russia through North Korea,” Yuan said.

Yuan said North Korea, with its “starving” population of less than 30 million, doesn’t have the capacity to produce large amounts of weapons.

“All of this military support came from the CCP, with North Korea merely acting as a white glove,” he said, using a Chinese expression for a fixer who does the dirty work.

Distracting the US by Supporting Russia, Iran

Yuan also said CCP leadership has been advised to ramp up support for Russia and Iran in preparation for an incoming Trump presidency, according to the report he obtained.

The report was produced in September by an ad-hoc think tank consisting of nine top geopolitical experts and military strategists from China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, he told the Vision Times in October.

According to Yuan, the report successfully predicted Donald Trump’s victory in the recent U.S. presidential election, and made a number of recommendations in response to what the authors believed would be the policies of the incoming administration.

Key recommendations in the report include efforts to paint Trump’s “America First” policy as being “extremely selfish,” to sow discord between the United States and its allies, and going on a diplomatic offensive to ease tensions and strengthen ties with the European Union, Australia, India, and countries in east and south Asia.

In this pool photograph distributed by the Russian state agency Sputnik, Russian President Vladimir Putin (L) shakes hands with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un after a signing ceremony following their bilateral talks at Kumsusan state residence in Pyongyang, on June 19, 2024. Kristina Kormilitsyna/Pool/AFP via Getty Images

Other recommendations include strengthening ties with Iran and Russia to keep the United States preoccupied.

According to Yuan, the CCP leadership was advised to increase military and economic aid to Russia and enable the deployment of more North Korean troops in a bid to give Russia more bargaining chips and make it more difficult for the United States to broker a cease-fire.

Preventing a cease-fire in the Russia-Ukraine conflict is a key strategy because the authors had a “rather pessimistic” assessment of the Israel–Hamas war, Yuan told The Epoch Times.

Assuming the Trump administration will fully support Israel, the report’s authors believe “Hamas will be eliminated, and Hezbollah will be significantly weakened,” he said, adding that the report focused on “keeping Iran stable, and consolidating the de facto alliance between China and Iran.”

According to Yuan, the PLA’s Engineering Corps has helped Hamas and Hezbollah build most of their underground tunnels in Gaza and Lebanon, and the CCP has also provided funding and large amounts of weapons to the terrorist groups.

Plans for Taiwan

Yuan described the CCP’s support for Russia and terrorist groups as the Party’s “basic strategy.”

The goal is to keep the United States preoccupied in Ukraine and the Middle East, so as to weaken the United States’ “political will and capacity” to intervene when the CCP invades Taiwan, he said.

The CCP has never ruled Taiwan but considers the self-governed island part of its territory and has not ruled out using force to bring it under its control.

In recent years, the Chinese military has conducted drills and coast guard patrols in the Taiwan Strait. For example, on Oct. 14, days after Taiwanese President Lai Ching-te said China and Taiwan “do not belong to one another” in his national day speech, Beijing dispatched military planes and ships to encircle the island.

According to Yuan, in the think tank report, CCP leaders were advised to establish a strategy to “solve the Taiwan issue by 2027.”

The report described the goal as a “political guarantee” for the CCP’s 21st National Congress, which is set for 2027, to go smoothly, suggesting party elites have banked the party’s legitimacy on absorbing the self-ruled island.

Adam Morrow and Lily Zhou contributed to this report.