Name: North Korea sends troops, ammunition to Russia: What it means for NATO | DW News
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And, as Russia steps up its attacks on Ukraine, the Kremlin is once again seeking help from North Korea.

South Korean intelligence reports that the country has already sent Russian weapons and North Korean troops could soon be sent to the front line.

DW's Sergei Stanislovsky reports on North Korea's role in Russia's new strategy.

Kim Jong-un is greeting Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov as a dear friend.

Lavrov, in turn, has only warm words for the North Korean leader.

The President sends you his warmest greetings and reaffirms his commitment to all the agreements that have been reached.

He looks forward to continuing direct contact with you in the very near future.

This meeting in the eastern port of Wonsan has left many wondering about its purpose.

Since the war in Ukraine began, Russia and North Korea have become closer than they've been since the fall of the Soviet Union.

A year ago, Putin and Kim signed an agreement for their countries to help each other if one faces military aggression.

Now South Korean intelligence reports that North Korea may have supplied Russia with up to 12 million artillery shells.

According to Ukrainian intelligence services, Pyongyang has been providing up to half of the shells Russia uses to attack Ukraine.

This meeting with Lavrov wasn't really about culture or tourism, and not even about soldiers.

It was specifically about ammunition and missiles, which Russia is using in massive quantities.

North Korea's planned economy happens to overproduce exactly those kinds of items in equally massive quantities.

Another clear area of cooperation between Russia and North Korea is military support.

The countries haven't revealed how many North Korean troops are ready to help Russia.

According to Ukrainian and allied intelligence, up to 30,000 North Korean troops could be sent to the front by the end of summer.

The North Korean army is larger than Russia's, so this is just a very small fraction.

They avoid sending ground troops because they're not very combat-ready.

Much of their time is spent working in the fields or studying the leader's ideology, but their special forces are fairly well-trained.

Last fall, South Korean intelligence reported that around 12,000 North Korean soldiers were sent to assist Russia.

In this footage from January, a Ukrainian investigator is believed to be questioning one of those soldiers captured by Ukrainian forces.

Without help from allies, including North Korea, it would be difficult for Russia to step up its attacks on Ukraine, as it is doing now.

Russia is not waging this war alone, as many people wrongly assume, but with the support of its allies.

For example, one can observe the use of North Korean ballistic missiles.

It gives Russia the capability to carry out drone attacks with an intensity of over 700 strikes.

As the West urges Russia to end the war, Russia's former president Dmitry Medvedev has just promised to step up attacks on Ukraine.

Now we are joined by Frank Ledwidge, military expert and senior lecturer in strategic studies at Portsmouth University.

Will there be North Koreans fighting for Russia and Ukraine soon?

The South Korean parliament was briefed by the National Intelligence Service about a month ago on this, and the estimates range up for between about 15 to 30,000 troops, I would say, on the lower end of that.

So yes, I think we will be seeing more North Korean assistance on the front.

Question is, of course, what kind of assistance and what difference they will make.

What difference do you think they'll make?

Well, I think it's very important not to underestimate, and I think one of the experts on there before hinted at that, underestimate these troops.

They're not, the Russians don't need them.

They don't have a manpower problem, particularly.

The purpose for the North Koreans is to get training.

Indeed, at the end of last year, there was a conference, believe it or not, in North Korea, as you would expect, to analyse the performance of these troops.

So what we're going to see there, we're going to see missile troops, of course, for the KN-23 missiles that cause Ukraine so many problems.

Now those will be prepared and trained according to the experience of last year, so we can't expect them to be used as cannon fodder or anything like that.

But as I say, the Russians don't particularly need them.

And from the Russian perspective, of course, and indeed from any military perspective, if you have a lot of foreign troops who don't have your doctrine training or even equipment, and I suspect these troops probably will look very much like Russian troops, they may not have the same training, that can sometimes be a drag on Russian or indeed any other national military effort.

But they will certainly help from the missile perspective, from the engineering perspective, they will send engineering construction troops as well.

So it's not a negative, and it will contribute to the Russian effort, no doubt about it.

Why do you think North Korea is doing this?

First of all, they're going to get money for this.

There will be money, cash, which North Korea needs for obvious reasons.

But secondly, and I think this is genuinely really important, and this is, I think, what's South Korean analysts, is North Korea will be getting North Korean army, particularly units being sent to a more elite units, units like the 11th Storm Corps, which were reportedly deployed and the Reconnaissance General Bureau.

That soldier you saw being interrogated there is probably from that.

Those will be getting the kind of training that South Korea prefer they didn't in modern warfare, in drone warfare, in modern operations, and in the intensity of modern combat.

So North Korea will be getting that kind of experience, and that's really, really valuable in a modern army, to get real combat experience.

Bearing in mind, of course, on the other hand, very few NATO countries have that kind of  So that's important for the North Koreans, no question.

Who should be worried about that combat experience?

I mean, is North Korea preparing for a war of its own, you think?

North Korea will say it's always preparing for war, and wars are just around the corner.

I think the key for the West, for our allies, if you like, is the danger that this presents or will present, not just to Ukraine, of course, it goes without saying, but to South Korea.

This is the first time North Korean troops, and of course, we had North Korean troops deployed last year, not terribly successfully, but they'll be learning.

This is the second major deployment of North Korean troops into combat, and that will concern South Korea, because South Korea, of course, they're the people who are going to have to face them at some point, or at least be prepared to deter them.

And clearly, that's a little bit more difficult if you have a large group, divisional size, 10, 20,000 troops, going, being deployed every year into a combat zone.

Frank, just briefly, how do you think Ukraine and its partners should respond to all of this?

Well, I would suggest there's not too much we could do about that, except ramp up our own production of weaponry, which is the key contribution of North Korea to this war.

They provide a significant proportion of Russia's ammunition at the moment.

Military expert, Frank Ledwidge of Portsmouth University.