In the third quarter of this year, a record-breaking 5,263 North Koreans entered Russia, with most of them holding student visas. This surge has raised suspicions that North Korea may be using these visas to disguise the deployment of military personnel to assist Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

North Korean troops have begun engaging in combat operations alongside Russian forces, the U.S. State Department said on Tuesday, expressing concern that Russia had turned to North Korea for soldiers to fight in its war with Ukraine.

"Today I can confirm that over 10,000 (North Korean) 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,