North Korean troops are sustaining heavy casualties while fighting Ukrainian forces in Russia’s Kursk region, western officials believe.
Ukrainian forces launched an incursion into Kursk in August, but have since lost more than 40 per cent of the territory they controlled.
In October, it emerged that around 10,000 North Korean troops were assisting with Moscow’s war effort.
However, western officials believe that the troops are sustaining heavy casualties in Kursk, partially due to difficulties in coordination caused by issues such as the language barrier.
Around 11,000 North Korean troops are understood to be deployed in the region.
Meanwhile, Russian forces are understood to have seized the village of Shevchenko in Donetsk Oblast, with troops now around 3km from the outskirts of the city of Pokrovsk.
Russian soldiers are also believed to have severed up to three supply routes into the town of Velyka Novosilka, a lynchpin of Ukraine’s defensive line in the region.
Western officials believe the town remains vulnerable despite Russia’s advances slowing in recent days.
Ukraine’s top army commander, Oleksandr Syrskyi, said on Tuesday that Moscow has intensified its attacks on Ukrainian forces in Kursk.
Earlier this month, the White House confirmed that North Korean forces have been battling on the front lines in largely infantry positions. They have been fighting with Russian units and, in some cases, independently around Kursk.
The escalation in fighting comes ahead of US President-elect Donald Trump’s return to the White House next month.
Mr Trump said on Monday that Ukraine should be prepared to make a deal with Russia to bring the nearly three-year-old war to an end.
Russia’s President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday that he was ready to compromise over Ukraine in possible talks with Mr Trump, but western officials believe there is no indication that Moscow is preparing to end the conflict.
During his campaign, Mr Trump promised to bring a swift end to the war but has not laid out plans for how this could be achieved.
On Thursday, Mr Putin said that he was ready to meet Mr Trump, whom he said he had not spoken to for years.
Asked what he might be able to offer Mr Trump, the Russian leader dismissed an assertion that Moscow was in a weak position, saying that Russia had got much stronger since he ordered troops into Ukraine in 2022.
Russia’s campaign of aggression in Ukraine has left tens of thousands of dead, displaced millions and triggered the biggest crisis in relations between Moscow and the West since the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis.
