For two North Korean soldiers captured by Ukrainian forces in January 2025 while fighting for Russia, their recent arrival in South Korea, where they requested to go, offers freedom and the prospect of a new life. But for their families left behind in the North, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s public disclosure of the transfer may have heightened potentially life-threatening risks, experts said Wednesday. They say the relatives may already have become vulnerable when the soldiers' capture was made public in January 2025, but the Kim Jong-un regime's retaliation against them could be harsher after Zelenskyy disclosed the soldiers' transfer to South Korea during his U.N. General Assembly speech on Sept. 23. Forced relocation, loss of official positions and tighter surveillance are among the possible consequences cited by the experts, although the families’ whereabouts and any punishments remain unconfirmed. “North Korea probably had already banished the families to remote mountainous areas and stripped those in official positions of their posts,” said Ahn Chan-il, a North