Ukraine war: who are Russia's allies?

North Korea is preparing to send more troops to fight alongside Russian forces in Ukraine, the latest sign of ever-closer military cooperation between the two authoritarian countries

Ostracised from the international community following its invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Russia has sought to secure closer ties with a number of allies – old and new – from the Middle East to Africa to Eastern Europe. This in turn has sparked alarm from the US and its allies that "growing coordination between anti-West countries is creating a much broader, urgent security threat – one where partnerships of convenience are evolving into more outright military ties", reported CNN.

North Korea 

The deployment of North Korean ground troops to counter Ukraine's incursion into Russia's Kursk region last autumn dramatically escalated what had been, up to that point, a "largely transactional" relationship, Edward Howell, a lecturer in international relations at the University of Oxford, told Al Jazeera.

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Having signed a comprehensive strategic partnership treaty in 2023 that commits both countries to provide military assistance to each other if either is attacked, Russian forces have become increasingly reliant on millions of rounds of North Korean artillery shells and ballistic missiles.

Western officials believe that of the 11,000 or so North Korean troops deployed to aid Russia, 40% have been either killed or wounded in just three months. The figures "point to an extraordinarily high cost" being incurred by Putin's ally, said the BBC.

South Korea has claimed the North's huge casualty numbers have meant "follow-up measures and preparations for additional deployment are being accelerated", said Al Jazeera.

This is likely to be the first of many further deployments, Keir Giles, Russia and Eurasia expert at UK think tank Chatham House, told Al Jazeera. "Russia – if all the estimates are to be believed – still badly needs the manpower, and North Korea still plainly values what it's getting in exchange for this".

This increasing reliance on North Korea is "only making the Kim family stronger by the day and filling the regime's bank accounts", Harry Kazianis, senior director of national security affairs at the Center for the National Interest in Washington told The Guardian.

China  

 The "two continent-sized authoritarian states" are "increasingly in dispute with democracies and Nato" as they "seek to gain influence in Africa, the Middle East and South America", said The Associated Press.

China has backed Putin's claim that Russia launched its assault against Ukraine in 2022 because of Western provocations, even as Beijing has tried to maintain at least the perception of neutrality.

Now even that is starting to wear thin. Recently, CNN said China has been accused of "powering Russia's war machine" with substantial amounts of "dual-use" goods like microelectronics and machine tools, which can be used to make weapons.

Chinese leader Xi Jinping has repeatedly emphasised strategic cooperation with Russia as part of a "no-limits" partnership that last year delivered a record $240 billion (£185 billion) in bilateral trade.

Boasting two of the world's "largest, best equipped, and best funded armed forces", China and Russia are undertaking joint military projects at an "unprecedented rate and in unprecedented places", said the Wilson Center think tank. "It seems that what's happening is something some analysts said couldn't happen: the two powers" are now "'going steady'."

Iran 

There are "many reasons why Russia and Iran are not formal allies", wrote Nikita Smagin for the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace think tank. "Their rulers don't trust one another; they compete with each other on energy markets; and Iran's revolutionary Shia ideology sits uneasily with Russia's conservatism." But "when it comes to military matters, they are drawing ever closer, united in their opposition to the United States".

Since the start of the war in Ukraine, Moscow's "growing dependence on Iranian military technology" has driven it "closer to Tehran", said Foreign Affairs. The two international pariah states have "forged unprecedented ties, strengthened by their shared isolation from the West and by military cooperation in Ukraine".

With Iran's axis of resistance weakened in recent months and fighting in Ukraine entering its third year, Moscow and Tehran have come to rely on each other more than ever. Iranian military support has "become critical for the Russian war effort, and Russian-assisted nuclear development is fast becoming Iran's most powerful leverage against Israel and the West".

South Africa

"For years, the relationship between South Africa and Russia has baffled pundits and governments in the West," said Al Jazeera. The two countries share "no cultural or linguistic ties", or "major trading" arrangements, yet South Africa – "like many other" countries on the African continent – has not condemned Moscow's war against Ukraine.

The roots of the relationship date back to the struggle against apartheid, when Moscow helped finance and train the African National Congress (ANC) in exile when most of the world was happy to do business with white supremacists.

While the "historical ties" between the ANC and Moscow predate "Russia's war in Ukraine" said DW, the "show of support from South Africa, the most developed economy and an influential voice on the African continent, has provided crucial backing for Russia as its invasion of Ukraine has made it a pariah elsewhere", said The New York Times.

South Africa's ANC president, Cyril Ramaphosa, has called Russia a "valued ally", but Ramaphosa's warm relationship with Putin has earned him "sharp criticism" from his coalition partners, the Democratic Alliance, which "does not recognise an authoritarian regime, especially one that is involved in a controversial military conflict, as a legitimate ally", said DW.

 Belarus 

 Belarus is Russia's "closest and most devoted ally", said DW. Formerly part of the Soviet Union, it has long relied on Moscow for oil and gas imports and subsidies to keep its economy afloat in the face of Western sanctions.

Ruled by authoritarian President Alexander Lukashenko, some have gone so far as to call Belarus a "puppet state" controlled from Moscow.

Russia used Belarus territory as a "springboard" to send its troops into Ukraine in February 2022, said the AP news agency, and "has maintained its military bases and weapons there, although Belarusian troops have not taken part in the war". Most worryingly for the West, Lukashenko has allowed Moscow to station nuclear arms within its borders, as well as fitting its bombers with nuclear weapons.

A recent investigation by the Belarusian Investigative Center, reported in The Moscow Times, revealed how a "Belarusian state-owned firm is supplying Russia with microchips needed to build rockets using Western equipment, components and raw materials in defiance of international sanctions". This, it adds, is helping the Kremlin "prolong its war".

But despite his obvious affinity with Putin, Lukashenko has also been playing a "skilful balancing act", said geopolitical forecasting website GIS. Since Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, he has provided "ample demonstration of his ability to manoeuvre between Russia and the West, antagonising both sides but not so much as to provoke serious countermeasures". However, this approach will become "increasingly strained" as the war in Ukraine drags on.