The North Korean announcement came two days after Russia said its troops have fully reclaimed the Kursk region. Ukrainian officials denied the claim.

VLADIMIR Putin has visited the Kursk region for the first time since his troops prised their land back from Ukraine in a long and costly face-saving mission. Zelensky’s forces bravely booted

North Korea's deployment of thousands of troops helped Russia push back a Ukrainian incursion. Read more at straitstimes.com. Read more at straitstimes.com.

During Russia's Victory Day parade, Putin embraces North Korean generals, highlighting the deepening military alliance amid the Ukraine conflict.- Watch Video on English Oneindia

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un supervised combined tactical drills of special operations forces and stressed "full preparations for war," state media reported Wednesday.

Putin yesterday staged his first visit to Kursk since Russia claimed it expelled all Ukrainian forces from the region

At a training site in Russia, the five North Korean soldiers had grins on their faces and guns in their hands. Then they began singing a cappella, belting out a Soviet-era song called “Katyusha" about a young woman bidding farewell to soldiers—in translated Korean-language lyrics.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un said North Korea’s involvement in the Russia-Ukraine war was justified, calling it an exercise of sovereign rights in defence of a “brother nation,” state media KCNA reported on Saturday.

KCNA reported Kim Jong Un saying that North Korea will ‘consolidate and develop the long tradition of the DPRK-Russia relations’.

Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed on May 22 that he ordered the military to begin creating a "security buffer zone" along the border with Ukraine, Russian state media outlets reported. The comments come a day after Putin made his first known visit to Russia's Kursk Oblast,