More than 3,000 North Korean soldiers have been killed or wounded in Vladimir Putin’s Ukraine war, claims Volodymyr Zelensky. The Ukrainian president alleged that the North Korean military had suffered such high casualties within weeks of being thrown into battle in attempts to recapture a swathe of the Kursk region of Russia seized by Kyiv troops in a surprise attack in the summer.

North Korea has lost more than 3,000 troops in about two months of combat in Russia’s Kursk region, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Monday — and he criticized world leaders for doing “almost nothing” to counter Moscow’s alliance with Pyongyang.

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Sunday hosted Slovakia’s prime minister, Robert Fico, in a rare visit to the Kremlin by an EU leader since Moscow’s all-out invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, in his evening address on Monday, 23 December, has once again criticised Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico, who on 22 December held talks with Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin regarding gas supplies.