The North Korean troops readying for deployment in Ukraine

North Korean soldiers are making their way to Ukraine to fight alongside the Russian army.

That is the "grim reality", said Edward Howell in The Spectator, after South Korea's intelligence agency confirmed what many had long suspected.

The move represents a "huge" escalation risk, Ukraine's Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha warned over the weekend. While the numbers are small compared to the millions of people involved in the overall war effort, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has warned that any third country wading into the conflict in Ukraine would be "the first step to a world war".

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What North Korean troops are involved?

Around 1,500 troops from North Korea's special forces have already been deployed to Russia en route to Ukraine, a number that could eventually rise to 10,000, according to Zelenskyy.

It is not clear whether North Korean troops will be involved in frontline fighting or in a support role, but their elite status is "probably more an indication of perceived political reliability than how they will be used", said The Guardian. Sybiha said there is now a "big risk" of the conflict "growing out of its current scale and borders".

Why is North Korea doing this?

As the war drags on into its third year, Russia is "increasingly looking abroad not only for weapons, equipment and other resources, but also for fighters and workers to supply its conflict", said The Guardian.

Russian forces have become increasingly reliant on millions of rounds of North Korean artillery shells and, in recent months, have used ballistic missiles supplied by Pyongyang in their attacks across Ukraine, in a clear breach of UN Security Council resolutions. Their relationship is "largely transactional", Howell, a lecturer in international relations at the University of Oxford, told Al Jazeera.

Russia's "obstinacy towards continuing the war, coupled with North Korea's desire for financial and technological assistance (and for food), has allowed relations between the two pariah states to reach a whole new level", said Howell in The Spectator.

Last summer, Vladimir Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un signed a comprehensive strategic partnership treaty that commits both countries to providing military assistance to each other if either is attacked. Now, the deployment of North Korean soldiers to fight in Ukraine "highlights just how far the partnership has escalated".

How worried should we be?

Deepening military ties between Russia and North Korea have "earned condemnation" from the United States, South Korea and Japan, said Al Jazeera, with the three countries last week announcing a new team to monitor arms sanctions on North Korea.

Besides material weapons, Pyongyang will gain Moscow's "unwavering support" in the UN Security Council as part of this deal, Howell told Al Jazeera. "Pyongyang can thus escape scot-free if it chooses to bolster its nuclear and missile programme through testing and launches, which, as we know, is what North Korea intends to do."

South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol warned that Pyongyang's involvement in the Ukraine conflict would pose a "grave security threat" to the world. The deployment of North Korean troops to Ukraine is a hugely symbolic moment in the "new, anti-western coalition" being forged between Russia, North Korea, China and Iran, said Howell in The Spectator. Moscow will do "all it can to prolong its now-global war".