A high-ranking representative of the U.S. Department of Defense has made this statement, as reported by RBK-Ukraine, citing The New York Times. This information is also reported by Kontrakty.UA.
Last fall, North Korea sent approximately 11,000 soldiers to assist Moscow's forces in the Kursk region in southern Russia, where the Ukrainian Armed Forces captured territory following a surprise operation last summer. Since their first combat engagement in early December, about a third of the North Korean soldiers have been killed or wounded, according to Ukrainian and American officials.
The Commander-in-Chief of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, Oleksandr Syrskyi, stated this week that North Korean casualties continue to rise, estimating that nearly half of the deployed soldiers have been either wounded or killed, though he warned that they are "highly motivated, well-trained," and "brave."
The North Korean armed forces, numbering 1.2 million, are among the largest standing armies in the world, and their entry into the war marks a significant escalation of a conflict that has been ongoing for nearly three years.
In Russia, the North Koreans were issued what one Pentagon official described as "pocket trash"—documents in which they are registered as residents of Russia's Far East.
President Volodymyr Zelensky stated that one of the captured soldiers was found to have a military ID in the name of a resident of Tuva, in southern Siberia. The data of a real Russian citizen was used for this, according to Ukrainian intelligence officials.
Even before North Korea sent troops to Russia, it was a major sponsor of Russia's military efforts. It sent millions of artillery shells to Moscow—now accounting for about half of the munitions Russia fires daily—and over 100 short-range ballistic missiles.