Kyrylo Budanov, head of Ukraine’s Main Intelligence Directorate, said North Korea’s assistance will bolster Russia’s long-range fire capabilities in Kursk Oblast and on the Ukrainian front, but he does not expect many new ground combat units.

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

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said the wounded North Korean soldiers were taken to Kyiv and are communicating with Ukrainian officials.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said he’s willing to hand over the soldiers to North Korea, if Kim Jong Un arranges for an exchange with Ukrainian prisoners of war in Russia.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy posted a video showing the apparent interrogation of two North Korean soldiers captured alive in the war.

Ukraine captured two wounded North Korean soldiers who were fighting on behalf of Russia in a Russian border region, South Korea’s intelligence service said.

Videos of captured North Korean troops posted online by Ukrainian President Zelensky show them admitting that they thought they were being sent on an exercise.

There is mounting evidence from the battlefield, intelligence reports and testimonies of defectors that some North Korean soldiers are resorting to extreme measures as they support Russia's three-year war with Ukraine.

NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte has warned that a Russian victory over Ukraine would undermine the dissuasive force of the world’s biggest military alliance and could cost trillions of dollars to restore the organization's credibility.

According to the BBC, 4,000 of the 11,000 North Korean soldiers in Russia have been killed, wounded, are missing, or have been captured. "They are cannon fodder, and the Russian officers care even less for them than they do for their own men,

The officials, who spoke on grounds of anonymity, said that out of the estimated 11,000 troops sent from North Korea, known as DPRK (Democratic People's Republic of Korea), 4,000 were battle casualties.