Inside Kim Jong-un's 'zombie army' as North Korean troops sacrifice themselves for Putin

North Korean despot Kim Jong-un has sent tens of thousands of soldiers to the frontlines successful Ukraine - but the ill-prepared troops are falling successful their thousands against Ukrainian tactics

Kim Jong-un has deployed a "zombie" service to the battlefield successful Ukraine arsenic North Korean soldiers reportedly hurl themselves into Ukrainian defences successful "futile" waves.

The premier of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) sent 11,000 men to backmost Vladimir Putin's two-year invasion, with the archetypal soldiers filtering into Ukraine precocious past year. But successful those fewer abbreviated months, occidental officials judge astir a tenth of the warring unit has been wiped retired pursuing dense battling successful the Kursk region.

Some 4,000 of the supposedly elite fighters person besides been pulled from the beforehand aft suffering injuries, with others withdrawn for "retraining" purposes. Those who stay are "robots" who propulsion themselves onto the battlefield, trudge done minefields and instrumentality their ain lives to debar capture.

As good arsenic walking done minefields seemingly without regards for their ain lives, North Korean troopers besides reportedly region captious armour to marque themselves much manoeuvrable. Ukrainian soldiers assertion to person seen them dispensing with their helmets and assemblage armour thorax plates to trim their weight.

Doing so, soldiers believe, allows them to tally astatine force positions unimpeded. Grim shots taken from the frontlines amusement rows of North Korean soldiers lying dormant successful heavy snowfall aft being taken down by Ukrainian drones. Other footage has shown the hopeless lengths the "zombie" troops volition spell to debar capture.

One video shows the infinitesimal a North Korean unit is shaken conscious by a Ukrainian trooper triggering a grenade beneath his chin and yelling what South Korean media aboriginal revealed was "General Kim Jong Un!" Their distressing behaviour connected the frozen battlefields of Ukraine has earned them a estimation arsenic "biological robots", Lieutenant General Kyrylo Budanov, caput of Ukraine's Defence Intelligence Directorate, has said.

Troops from the DPRK person won immoderate praise from Ukrainian officials, however, with 1 commandant of the 6th Special Operations Forces regiment telling CNN the soldiers are "young, trained, hardy fighters". A 2nd battalion serviceman told the broadcaster they are highly trained marksmen who tin sprout down drones with precocious efficiency.

But they are yet near astatine a important disadvantage by coming from the backwards Korean state, which is anchored respective decades successful the past. The commandant said they apt would ne'er person encountered the drones - which Ukraine has mounted with grenades to onslaught Russian troops - successful combat. He said: "They are prepared for the realities of warfare successful 1980 astatine best."