North Korean troops recently took part in fighting in Russia’s Kursk region for the first time, according to a Reuters report, citing two US officials on Wednesday.

According to one of the officials, speaking anonymously, the troops were engaged in fighting on November 4.

Officials did not release details about casualties or the nature of the fighting, the report added.

President Volodymyr Zelensky said Tuesday that the first fighting between the Ukrainian army and North Korean troops “opens a new page of instability in the world” after his defense minister said a “small engagement” had taken place.

According to a BBC According to a report, in an interview with South Korean television channel KBS, Ukrainian Defense Minister Rustem Umerov earlier confirmed that a “small group” of North Korean soldiers had been attacked.

Ukraine says about 11,000 North Korean troops are stationed in the Kursk border region, where Ukrainian forces are present.

In recent weeks, intelligence services from South Korea, the United States and NATO have indicated that North Korean troops may be involved in the Russian war.

However, Moscow and Pyongyang have yet to respond to these allegations.

Ukraine’s top counter-disinformation official, Andriy Kovalenko, said for the first time Monday in a Telegram post that the “first military units… (had) already come under fire in Kursk,” reported BBC.

Umerov confirmed this to South Korean broadcaster KBS, saying he expects a “significant number” of North Korean troops to be engaged in the fighting, while adding that he was “so far small contacts and not large-scale engagement”.

Most of them are still in training, he added.

“They wear Russian uniforms, undergo tactical training and are deployed under different commands of the Russian army on the front lines,” Umerov was quoted as saying.

He added that it was likely that five units, each consisting of around 3,000 troops, would be deployed to the battlefield.

He did not specify whether there were any casualties.

With the contribution of agencies