North Korea now has boots on the ground in Ukraine, US confirms

North Korean soldiers have begun fighting against Ukraine alongside their Russian allies, the US State Department said, after Pyongyang sent thousands of troops to Russia’s Kursk region to aid the Kremlin’s war efforts.

“Today I can confirm that over 10,000 DPRK soldiers have been sent to eastern Russia, and most of them have moved to the far western Kursk Oblast, where they have begun engaging in combat operations with Russian forces,” State Department spokesman Vedant Patel said in a briefing on Tuesday, using the initials of the North’s official name.

It marks the first time the United States has confirmed that North Korean troops are directly engaged in the conflict after Ukrainian officials earlier said their forces had faced North Korean troops in battle. South Korea’s defence ministry did not immediately confirm the engagement.

Russia has trained North Korean soldiers in artillery, drone and other skills necessary for front line operations but it remains to be seen how well the two forces will be integrated as they fight alongside each other, Patel said.

“Some of the challenges they would need to overcome are interoperability, the language barrier, command and control, and communications,” he said.