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Vitalii Ovcharenko, a Ukrainian soldier, has been learning a new language: Korean. “I’ve picked up a few phrases. They are: ‘Hands up, drop your weapon and come to us slowly,’” he said. “Also: ‘Throw off your body armour and helmet.’”

Ovcharenko has been mugging up with the help of a three-page printed guide. It lists words in Ukrainian, their Korean equivalent, and a helpful transliteration.

The guide now lives next to a shelf of detective novels and histories celebrating Stalin at his temporary home in Russia’s Kursk region. The books belong to the property’s former owner, who fled in August when Ukraine launched a counter-invasion. Three months on, Kyiv controls a significant chunk of Russian territory around the border town of Sudzha.

Vitalii Ovcharenko, a Ukrainian soldier fighting in Russia’s Kursk oblast. He has been learning Korean phrases ahead of the deployment of 10,000 North Korean troops on the battlefield. Photograph: Alessio Mamo/The Guardian

So far, Moscow has been unable to end this embarrassing situation. It has launched air attacks on Ukrainian positions using kamikaze drones and guided bombs – up to 100 a day – and carries out assaults using small infantry groups. Amid heavy losses, Vladimir Putin has turned to a new and extraordinary source of manpower: North Korean troops, sent by the regime’s supreme leader, Kim Jong-un.

According to US intelligence, 10,000 North Korean soldiers have arrived in Russia, a figure that Ukraine’s military intelligence chief says includes 500 officers and three generals. These reinforcements – seen in videos gathering at ranges in Russia’s far eastern Khabarovsk region – are already fighting near Sudzha, and Kyiv says a “small engagement” took place this week. North Korea has pledged to support Moscow until it achieves a “great victory” in Ukraine.

Trenches in Ukraine’s north-east Sumy region. They are part of new defences built to stop a second Russian attack, after Russia’s 2022 full-scale invasion. Photograph: Alessio Mamo/The Guardian

What exactly their impact will be on the battlefield is unclear. Ukrainian soldiers seem largely unconcerned. “We don’t know how Moscow will train them or communicate with them. They might be fanatical professionals with totalitarian souls. Or guys lacking experience from another continent. Either way, we’re ready for the threat,” Ovcharenko said. He predicted: “They will just die uselessly.”

Volodymyr Zelenskyy has hinted that Ukraine’s Kursk salient could play a role in negotiations after Donald Trump’s return to the White House. Zelenskyy has accused the US, UK and Germany of passively “watching” as North Korea “fights in Europe”, and he has called on allies to lift restrictions on the use of long-range weapons, saying they could wipe out North Korean troops mustering in western Russia. Kyiv was no longer fighting one country but two, he posted on X.

North Korea has already given Russia 3.5m artillery shells and short-range missiles, used to hit Kharkiv. As well as fighting, North Koreans could be sent to work in munitions factories and to guard border areas, freeing up Russian troops. Moscow is reportedly helping its ally with rice, space technology, and providing $2,000 a month for soldiers.

“Five years ago it would have seemed fantastical. This is our reality,” Lt Col Artem Kholodkevych, the chief of staff of Ukraine’s 61st mechanised brigade, told the Guardian. “European countries need to consider how to respond.” He suggested Pyongyang’s involvement showed Putin desired a long and bloody conflict.

Lt Col Artem Kholodkevych, the chief of staff of the 61st mechanised brigade, which is fighting in Russia’s Kursk region. He lost a leg in 2022 while liberating the southern city of Kherson. Photograph: Alessio Mamo/The Guardian

Kholodkevych said the frontline had stabilised in the past two weeks in the Kursk region after a Russian counter-offensive and Ukraine’s defences were holding. Last week his units thwarted a raid on a frontline village, knocking out one enemy armoured vehicle with a drone and chasing away a second. Ten Russian soldiers dismounted. “We killed them,” he said.

Ukrainian-held territory in Russia’s Kursk region

Critics have argued that the Kursk operation has sucked troops away from eastern Ukraine, where Russia is advancing at the quickest rate since 2022. Kholodkevych disagreed. He said the surprise offensive had punctured the myth of Russian invincibility, especially in the eyes of international partners, and raised morale. It also pre-empted a probable attack by Russia on Ukraine’s Sumy oblast, next to Sudzha.

“In terms of size we are an expeditionary corps. It’s not a big number of soldiers,” Kholodkevych said. “Our plan is to hold this territory for as long as possible. We don’t want to occupy it. The goal is to make them burn through resources.” On 22 October his brigade had captured four Russian soldiers, 12 days after they were first conscripted. “They had minimal training. Putin has a problem,” he added.

Anvar Hisoriev, the commander of the 225th separate assault brigade, which is fighting in Russia’s Kursk region. He said Ukraine was fighting a global coalition including Russia, North Korea and Iran. Photograph: Alessio Mamo/The Guardian

Anvar Hisoriev, the commander of the 225th separate assault brigade’s drone strike company, said Ukraine was facing a deepening anti-western coalition. It primarily featured Russia, North Korea and Iran, and more loosely China and India, who bought Russian oil and gas. “If this is a war between democracy and dictatorship, why do we have restrictions? Do democracies not want us to win?” he asked.

Hisoriev said his men dug in in Kursk had not encountered any North Koreans but were motivated and experienced, and in need of arms. “We have the right soldiers. They are good people. But we need more weapons. Without them we can’t exploit the enemy’s weaknesses,” he said.

Since summer, the north-eastern city of Sumy has become a major military hub for Ukraine’s Kursk operation. Humvees, trucks and a soldier on a quad bike could be seen last week rattling over a busy potholed road in the direction of Sudzha and the city of Kursk. The now defunct international border with Russia is 18 miles from Sumy. Concrete pyramids topped with razor wire and first world war-style trenches line the route.

Ukrainian soldiers on their way to the frontline in Russia’s Kursk region. Photograph: Alessio Mamo/The Guardian

A group of newly mobilised Ukrainian service personnel smoked next to their pickup transport. One of them, Ivan, said he had had six weeks’ training and would be fighting in Russia for the first time. Was he worried? “No. It will be cold. We are used to it,” he replied. His squad piled on to the vehicle’s rear cargo bed, clutching sleeping mats and box of chocolate biscuits. An officer shouted: “Everybody here?”. The vehicle roared off.

A military driver, Pavel, said his brigade had taken fewer casualties in Kursk oblast than in Ukraine. “Just four of our guys have been killed and 10 wounded,” he said.

Volodymyr Niankin, a Ukrainian film director in the city of Sumy. He was optimistic about Ukraine’s Kursk offensive and said Russia had intensified its bombing of his home region. Photograph: Alessio Mamo/The Guardian

Volodymyr Niankin, a director who made a film about Sumy’s resistance in 2022, said he had noticed a buildup of forces before Ukraine’s Kursk incursion. The vehicles were marked with triangles. Post-offensive, Russia stepped up its attacks on Sumy using Iranian-made Shahed drones and ballistic missiles, he said. “Before 6 August it was mostly quiet. Now there are three or four strikes a week. It’s a rodeo with all types of weapons.”

The cross-border assault has allowed engineers to fix the gas supply to Ukrainian border villages of broken houses and yellowing autumnal pine forests, something that had been impossible because of intense shelling. “I remain optimistic. But of course it’s war. People hope it will end in the next half a year. They are very tired,” Niankin said.

Ukrainian service personnel inside Russia joke that whoever captures the first North Korean prisoner of war will be rewarded with a crate of champagne. “In reality, we will hand North Koreans over to the competent organs,” Ovcharenko said. Six North Korean officers have already been killed, Ukrainian media reports say.

Destruction in the village of Kyyanytsya, near the border with Kursk region. Photograph: Alessio Mamo/The Guardian

Ovcharenko said he thought Russians in Sudzha were unlikely to shelter wounded foreign soldiers. He said locals he talked to used derogatory words to describe people from Chechnya, and pointed out neighbours who had fraternised with them. “There is incredible racism here. I found it pretty shocking,” he said.

In his view the Kursk raid had been a success, the unwelcome arrival of four North Korean brigades and early clashes notwithstanding. “We’ve achieved more than we wanted or expected. Things are not easy in a war. But in general we feel positive.”

Which language would he study next? “First I need to improve my Korean. Then Farsi, which is spoken in Iran, and after that some Chinese,” he said.

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