It was revealed last month that 12,000 North Korean troops had been sent to Ukraine to fight on behalf of Russia. Now, they are reported to have been deployed to Kursk as part of the Russian counter-offensive,

European governments and the U.S. have so far denied Kyiv permission to use their weapons for long-range strikes into Russia. Moscow has said such a move would be treated as tantamount to their direct involvement in the conflict, raising fears that it would open them up for retaliatory action.