US says around 8,000 troops from North Korea are stationed in Russia's Kursk region

The Biden administration has said that around 8,000 soldiers from North Korea are now in Russia near Ukraine's border and are preparing to help the Kremlin fight against Ukrainian troops in the coming days.

The new figure is a dramatic increase from a day earlier, when Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin would only say "some" of the troops had moved toward Ukraine’s border in the Kursk region, where Moscow's forces have struggled to push back a Ukrainian incursion.

It would also mean most of the North Korean troops that the US and its allies say have been sent to Russia are now on the Russia-Ukraine border.

"DPRK [North Korea] participation in combat against Ukraine would be an alarming expansion of the conflict. Already, the DPRK's troop deployment in Russia marks a dangerous expansion in Russian-DPRK ties," Robert A. Wood, the Deputy US Ambassador to the United Nations, said at a Security Council session.

"Russia's actions with respect to the DPRK are not only dangerous, but they are antithetical to its responsibility as a permanent member of this UN Security Council. Russia's military cooperation with the DPRK violates multiple UN Security Council resolutions, which prohibit both procuring DPRK arms and providing military training."

The US has estimated a total of 10,000 North Korean troops are in Russia. Seoul and its allies said that the number has increased to 11,000, while Ukraine has put the figure higher, at up to 12,000.

Ukraine's president Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that while North Korean troops have been deployed to Kursk, they have not yet taken part in any hostilities.

"They are already in the Kursk region. They will use these troops. Of course, these people will die. Of course, they will try to do everything to make