South Korea's military said on Friday that it suspects North Korea is preparing to send more troops to Russia to fight Ukrainian forces, even after suffering losses and seeing some of its soldiers captured.

According to preliminary estimates, the total number of casualties exceeded 3,000 soldiers, including 2,700 wounded. This follows an earlier statement by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Jan.

A thousand North Korean troops who have been fighting in the Kursk region of Russia have been killed in Vladimir Putin ’s war with Ukraine, officials have said. Western officials have told the BBC that 36 per cent of North Korean forces fighting in Russia had been killed, injured or captured by mid-January.

South Korea’s spy agency has told lawmakers that two North Korean soldiers captured by Ukrainian forces while fighting alongside Russian forces in Russia’s Kursk border region haven’t expressed a desi

Soldiers fighting for Ukraine describe facing relentless waves of determined North Korean troops, Russian units with improved tactics, and Ukraine’s own struggles with exhaustion and sinking morale.

Kim Jong Un's soldiers have joined the Russians in the war against Ukraine. Although North Korean military personnel are suffering heavy casualties in the battles, they have also developed a method for destroying Ukrainian drones.

Ukraine's military said 21 troops were killed and 40 injured in the operation in the Russian region where it is staging an incursion.