India and China have reached an agreement on military disengagement along their disputed border, New Delhi said, a step toward reducing frictions between the nuclear-armed neighbors that comes as both countries’ leaders arrive in Russia for a summit.

India’s foreign minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar on Monday said the agreement on military patrolling in certain areas brought the situation back to where it was in 2020 prior to a deadly border clash that year, thus completing the “disengagement process” with China.

Beijing later confirmed on Tuesday that the two sides had “reached a solution” following “close communication on relevant issues of the China-India border through diplomatic and military channels.”

The announcement has been widely seen as setting the stage for potential talks between Chinese leader Xi Jinping and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who each headed Tuesday to Kazan in southwestern Russia for a summit of BRICS nations.

Both foreign ministries declined to comment on whether the two leaders would hold formal one-on-one talks in Kazan.

Neither side released full details of the agreement or details of how it would be carried out in the contentious, high-altitude region that has long been a source of friction between New Delhi and Beijing.

Both India and China maintain a significant military presence along their 2,100-mile (3,379-kilometer) de facto border, known as the Line of Actual Control (LAC), which has never been clearly defined and has remained a source of friction since a bloody war between the two countries in 1962.

The clash four years ago along the disputed border between Indian Ladakh and Chinese-controlled Aksai Chin brought the first known fatalities in more than four decades – with at least 20 Indian and four Chinese soldiers killed.

In a rare face-to-face meeting at last year’s BRICS summit in Johannesburg, Xi and Modi agreed to “intensify efforts” to deescalate tensions at the contested border.Chinese and Indian negotiators held the 31st round of border talks in late August.

While an agreement on further disengagement on the border appears poised to be a significant step in what has been a sore point among other frictions in the China-India relationship, observers said more details were needed to understand the scope of the arrangement and what concessions may have been made.

‘A positive development’

The violence in 2020 was followed by a process of disengagement and border talks, but friction points have remained, including areas where both sides previously patrolled but have since become so-called buffer zones.

Within India, the situation had also raised questions over whether the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) was using the buffer zones to further push back the areas within which Indian forces can patrol. India’s Ministry of Defense has previously denied the loss of any territory during the standoff.

Speaking about the new agreement at an event hosted by Indian broadcaster NDTV Monday, India’s Minister of External Affairs described how after the 2020 clash the two sides had “blocked” each other in certain areas.

“What has happened is, we have reached an understanding which will allow the patrolling … the understanding, to my knowledge, is that we will be able to do the patrolling which we were doing in 2020,” Jaishankar said.

“It is a positive development. I would say it is a product of a very patient and very persevering diplomacy,” he said, adding that the consequences of the agreement on the two nations’ relationship had yet to be seen.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lin Jian on Tuesday said Beijing “positively evaluates” the “solution” reached and would “work with India to implement the above solution,” without providing further details. Lin’s comments were made during a regularly scheduled media briefing.

It’s not clear why the two sides did not release a joint statement on the issue, and observers say the governments need to release more details of the arrangement before it can be fully evaluated.

Manoj Kewalramani, who heads Indo-Pacific studies at the Takshashila Institution research center in the Indian city of Bangalore, said a restoration of patrolling rights would be a “significant starting point” for normalization.

However, even with that restoration, there are other steps that would need to be taken in a long process along the disputed border.

“There are many other issues of de-induction and de-mobilization of troops on both sides; infrastructure that has been built, etc. These issues will take time,” he said.

The sun blisters the arid ground in Karnal, a district in India’s northern Haryana state, where empty houses stand testament to an acute problem that’s driving some residents to take unimaginable risks.

There are no jobs here, so young educated locals who dream of a better life are paying thousands of dollars to flee the world’s fastest growing major economy for the United States.

“It is the donkey way,” said law student Ankit Chaudhary. “It is a route which is going through many of the countries and then we will jump the wall of the USA.”

But he lost his money and the opportunity to flee when his agent was raided.

The risky journey is part of a worrying new trend in the country of 1.4 billion people, and one that could strain ties between the India and the US, where illegal immigration remains a key issue ahead of November’s presidential vote.

In just four years, the number of Indian citizens illegally entering the US has surged dramatically — from 8,027 in the 2018 to 2019 fiscal year to 96,917 during 2022 to 2023 period, government data showed.

Recent Pew research found that as of 2022, Indians made up the third-largest group of undocumented migrants in the US, behind people from Mexico and El Salvador.

The numbers speak to the desperation faced by Indians in the world’s largest democracy and stand in stark contrast to the powerful and robust image that Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is trying to project on the world stage. He’s aiming to turn the world’s most populous nation into a global superpower by 2047.

“Viskit Bharat (Developed India) is a nation where no one is too small to dream and no dream is too big to achieve,” Modi said in May. “Viksit Bharat is a nation where social circumstances or birth do not limit anyone’s growth. Everyone, no matter who they are, can aspire to reach the heights of success.”

But not everyone is convinced the dream is real.

Chaudhary is planning to apply for a US visa, but if that fails, he says he will have no choice but to take the dangerous illegal route out.

“People have no source of income, no government jobs. Some people are (hungry),” Chaudhary said. “I have no other option but to migrate.”

Too few jobs

There were no young people in sight. Instead, elderly men sat on the stoops outside some homes, smoking hookahs and shuffling cards.

The homes of parents whose children have settled abroad were easily identifiable; swanky bungalows with SUVs parked outside and tractors that had the American flag painted on them, bought with funds sent back home.

During the fiscal year from 2022 to 2023, the unemployment rate of people aged 15 and above in Haryana state stood at 6.1%, according to data released by India’s Ministry of Labour and Employment, nearly double the national average for the same period.

But for people age 15 to 24, the number was significantly higher – 45.4% across the country in the same year. Official unemployment rates in developing countries tend to be low because very few people can afford to be unemployed for long, so they take whatever work they can find, however inadequate.

“He was thinking about it for a long time,” Kumar said. “(There are) no jobs here … he wanted to go there and make money so the family could be happy.”

The family borrowed $30,000 from relatives and friends to pay an agent to smuggle Malkeet into the US via the now infamous “donkey route,” his brother said.

They said it involved taking a flight out of New Delhi and flying via countries with relatively favorable visa requirements, before landing in Latin America, if they are entering via the southern US border.

There, the migrants meet smugglers who then guide them through treacherous jungles to the US-Mexico border, where they wait to be picked up by border enforcement agents and request asylum. When asked, many have been trained to say they do not feel safe in India and that their lives are in danger, the families said.

Malkeet left India in February, first flying to Dubai before continuing to Almaty, Kazakhstan, according to his family. From there, he traveled to Turkey, where he transited in Istanbul airport for 24 hours, before boarding a plane to Panama City and then San Salvador.

There, he met with a smuggler and disconnected his phone before embarking on the toughest, most strenuous leg of the journey: north, towards Guatemala.    

India’s population paradox

With an average age of 29 years, India has one of the world’s youngest populations, but the country is not yet able to reap the potential economic benefits of its young workers.

According to a March report by the International Labour Organization, educated Indians between the ages of 15 and 29 are more likely to be unemployed than those without any schooling, reflecting “a mismatch with their aspirations and available jobs.”

“The Indian economy has not been able to create enough remunerative jobs in the non-farm sectors for new educated youth labour force entrants, which is reflected in the high and increasing unemployment rate,” the report said.

Lawyer Muzaffar Chishti, director at the Migration Policy Institute in New York, said “push factors like these are what matter in the decision for people to make the journey.”

Chishti, who has been watching illegal immigration trends into the US, said: “If these young men and women know that there is a good chance, even a 50% chance that they will get into the US … that is a magnet.”

Until a recent Biden Administration crackdown on the border, there was reason to believe that embarking on the trip could bring success.

Many who have attempted the journey have vlogged about it, amassing tens of thousands of views on YouTube, Instagram and TikTok, all while selling the idea of “the American Dream.”

Ankush Malik, whose YouTube channel has close to 60,000 subscribers, is among those who have successfully crossed into the US via Mexico. He now works as a truck driver and often flaunts his wealth to his fans, boasting of buying $95 perfume, living in a large house and visiting multiple cities as a trucker.

But not every video paints a rosy picture.

Malik documented his entire journey from Haryana to the US, flying via Qatar and Amsterdam, before reaching Panama to begin his jungle trek. In one of the videos, the men appear weak and tired, dripping in sweat, with bug bites on their legs and arms, while staying on the lookout for other critters as they stop to rest for the night.

One of the migrants looks at the camera with sullen eyes and a rugged beard. Pale and hungry, he says: “10 lakh rupees ($12,000) has gone to waste. They’ve made a donkey out of us.”

Claiming asylum

If they make it to the US, the migrants’ unpredictable journey begins to follow a typical routine as they wait for Customs and Border Protection officers to pick them up, according to Chishti.

“The customs official first must determine whether the person is in physical danger or not. Whether they’re malnourished or not,” he said.

“They give them a bottle of water. At that point, the person (who just crossed into the US) says ‘I’m here to seek asylum.’”

According to US law, if someone claims asylum, they must be given a hearing to make their case. While they wait, the customs official takes them to a processing facility, where they’re given a medical screening. Security checks are conducted, and the migrants are interviewed.

Following the screening, the official decides whether to consider their asylum application, which could take years to process.

While in the US, asylum applicants can apply for employment authorization and must wait at least 180 days for a work permit.

In 2023, 46% of asylum claims from Indian nationals were approved, according to the Justice Department.

Earlier this summer the Biden Administration issued an executive order largely barring migrants from seeking asylum at the US southern border and levying harsh consequences on those illegally crossing.

US Border Patrol have since reported a dramatic drop in illegal cross border traffic. In September, Border Patrol officers reported around 54,000 encounters, the lowest number recorded since 2020.

But contrary to his claims, US authorities found he faced no persecution in India, and he was eventually sent home.

The man wanted to remain anonymous as he is attempting to make the trip yet again. “I don’t earn enough while farming here,” he said.

An agent from Haryana, who did not want to be named for legal reasons, said he has sent between 150 to 200 people via the “donkey route” to the US.

But this month, the agent said conditions for migrants had changed dramatically.

“There has been an increase in the number of people being deported for certain,” he said. “This has caused fear in those going illegally and the agents involved in the donkey route.” 

The agent said he has completely stopped his work.

“Most people are now holding off going to the United States via donkey,” the second agent said. “They do not want to spend thousands of dollars for nothing.”

As he campaigns for a return to the White House, Trump has made clear his views on immigration, blaming migrants for everything from rising crime to eating people’s pets.

“Our country is being lost, we’re a failing nation,” Trump said in September’s presidential debate with Democratic nominee Kamala Harris.

“In my opinion the donkey route will never completely stop,” said the first agent.

“Even earlier during Trump’s time, we sent people. There will be newer routes, networks, and ways one may have to devise to get there.”

‘It has become do or die’

Kumar waited anxiously at home in India as his brother Malkeet embarked on the donkey route from India last year.

Malkeet sent images of his plane tickets and selfie videos along the way before setting off on the riskiest leg, the trek north through Guatemala.

Kumar had hoped for news that his brother had made it. Instead, he received videos that confirmed he hadn’t.

“We got videos (of his dead body) via many WhatsApp groups. Someone showed it to us and asked if it was my brother and we identified him,” Kumar said.

The family learned Malkeet had been shot and killed by criminals on a riverbank on the El Salvador-Guatemala border.

Malkeet’s body was returned to them nearly five months later.

“It is impossible to fill the loss of my brother,” said Kumar, who now toils on his family’s fields alone.

But despite the tragedy, people remain undeterred. Kumar says young people in his village still dream of smuggling themselves somewhere overseas

“People here know they will die from unemployment, so they think it is better to go and take the risk,” he said. “For people here it has become do or die.”

Growing unease over the United States’ inability to de-escalate tensions in the Middle East is prompting some of Washington’s closest Arab allies to significantly increase engagement with its primary regional adversary: Iran.

Over the past few months, Arab nations have been leveraging their revived relations with the Islamic Republic to ward off a wider regional war as the US fails to contain an impending regional escalation.

US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken landed in Israel for his eleventh trip to the region in a year on Tuesday in an apparent effort to take advantage of the killing of Hamas leader and October 7 architect Yahya Sinwar to reach a ceasefire in Gaza. US officials, however, are tempering expectations as Washington’s calls for calm fall on deaf ears and Israel vows to push ahead with its wars in Gaza and Lebanon.

Blinken’s visit also comes as Israel prepares a response to Tehran’s October 1 firing of hundreds of missiles in one of the biggest ever attacks on the Jewish state. The strike was in response to Israel’s assassination of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah last month and its suspected killing of Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran in July.

Arab nations have long been suspicious of Shiite Iran’s role in a region that is dominated by US-allied Sunni states, and share Israel’s concerns about its support for non-state Islamist groups.

For the past month, Tehran has tried to gauge their position on its conflict with Israel, dispatching its top officials and diplomats for an intensive campaign of diplomacy with its neighbors, many of whom host US military personnel and bases. Arab nations that had spent decades brawling with Iran for regional influence are now opting to engage with it again.

Intensified diplomacy

In a rare meeting this month, Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohamed bin Salman, who once called Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei the “new Hitler of the Middle East,” sat down with Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi in Riyadh. It was the third meeting between Iranian and Saudi officials in one month. Tehran’s top diplomat also met Jordan’s King Abdullah II in Amman and made a rare trip to Egypt for a meeting with President Abdel Fattah Al Sisi in Cairo. He has also met Qatar’s prime minister in Doha, the Omani foreign minister in Muscat and the Bahraini king in Manama.

Those efforts appeared to have borne fruit.

“All our friends gave us assurances that their land and airspace will not be used to attack Iran… We are expecting this from all countries in the region,” Araghchi said after meeting Kuwait’s Crown Prince Sabah Al-Sabah in Kuwait City.

“The Gulf (Arab) monarchies’ priority is not to be directly involved in a proper regional conflagration. They fear they would be targeted and would end up being directly hit in the crossfire,” said Cinzia Bianco, a visiting fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations. “They think the best way to avoid such a scenario is to make themselves very useful interlocutors for both sides and especially Iran, which is the most likely party to attempt hitting them.”

Israel’s actions in Lebanon and Gaza have significantly degraded Hezbollah and Hamas, groups that some Arab states and their media outlets have described as “terrorists.” While some Gulf Arab states may privately welcome the development, experts say they are very concerned about the potential of significant escalation in regional violence should Israel not be contained.

The Biden administration’s yearlong effort to mediate a ceasefire deal in Gaza and contain the violence in Lebanon has failed. The US has also struggled to convince Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to de-escalate.

A ‘critical juncture’

Gulf Arab states like Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), two of the world’s top oil producers, have in recent years steered their foreign policies away from conflict to serve their economic interests, which has seen them repair ties with former adversaries like Iran. But they fear that an uncontained regional war could throw a wrench into their economic ambitions.

Gulf Arab nations that have come under attack several times from Iran-allied groups have grown skeptical of the US’ willingness to protect them if Iran strikes. Saudi Arabia’s oil facilities were hit in 2019 in an attack Washington blamed on Tehran, and the Iran-backed Houthi group in Yemen struck Abu Dhabi in 2022. The US did not intervene.

The UAE was disappointed by President Joe Biden’s de-designation of the Houthis as a terrorist organization soon after he took office, and the US failure to re-designate it in the wake of the Abu Dhabi attacks. The US only reinstated the terror designation this year after group started attacking shipping in the Red Sea to punish Israel after October 7.

“The sentiment in the Gulf has certainly shifted,” Bianco said, adding that “the Gulf monarchies have lost faith in their primary security guarantor, the United States.”

The shift in sentiment is the result of what Gulf states see as a yearslong effort by the US to step back from the Middle East as it moves its focus to China. Still, regional states rely heavily on their military relationship with the US. Saudi Arabia is seeking a formalized security agreement with Washington and the UAE, which hosts some 5,000 US military personnel, is expected to become a major US defense partner.

Just a week before Hamas’ October 7 attack last year, US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said in a discussion at the Atlantic Festival in Washington, D.C. that the Middle East “is quieter today than it has been in two decades.”

“The amount of time I have to spend on crisis and conflict in the Middle East today compared to any of my predecessors going back to 9/11 is significantly reduced,” he said, adding that the US’ efforts were focused on regional integration and normalization with Israel which “could create a greater and more stable foundation as we go forward.”

A real Chinese blockade of Taiwan would be an act of war and have far-reaching consequences for international trade, Defense Minister Wellington Koo said on Wednesday after last week’s drills by China that practiced such a scenario.

China, which views democratically governed Taiwan as its own territory, has over the past five years staged almost daily military activities around the island, including war games that have practiced blockades and attacks on ports. Taiwan’s government rejects Beijing’s sovereignty claims.

China’s latest war games around the island, carried out last week, included simulating blockading key ports and areas, and assaulting maritime and ground targets, Beijing said.

Speaking to reporters at parliament, Koo noted that while those “Joint Sword-2024B” delineated the exercise area, there were no no-flight or no-sail zones.

“If you really want to carry out a so-called blockade, which according to international law is to prohibit all aircraft and ships entering the area, then, according to United Nations resolutions, it is regarded as a form of war,” he said.

“I want to stress that drills and exercises are totally different from a blockade, as would be the impact on the international community.”

Pointing to data that showed one-fifth of global freight passed through the Taiwan Strait, a blockade would have consequences beyond Taiwan, Koo said.

“The international community could not sit by and just watch.”

While those war games last only a day, Chinese military activity has continued. China has never renounced the use of force to bring Taiwan under its control.

Carrier in the strait

Taiwan’s Defense Ministry said earlier on Wednesday that a Chinese aircraft carrier group sailed through the Taiwan Strait, travelling in a northerly direction after passing through waters near the Taiwan-controlled Pratas islands.

The ministry said the Chinese ships, led by Liaoning, the oldest of China’s three aircraft carriers, were spotted on Tuesday night, and its forces monitored the fleet. The Pratas are at the northern end of the South China Sea.

Koo said the Liaoning was sailing to the western side of the strait’s median line, an unofficial barrier between the two sides China says it does not recognize.

China’s Defense Ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The Liaoning was involved in those same Chinese war games last week near Taiwan.

Taiwan said at the time that the Liaoning operated off the island’s southeast coast during those drills, launching aircraft off its deck.

Japan said last month the same carrier had entered Japan’s contiguous waters for the first time.

China has sailed its carriers through the strategic strait before, including in December shortly before Taiwan held elections.

China says it alone has jurisdiction over the nearly 180-kilometer (110 miles) wide waterway that is a major passageway for international trade. Taiwan and the United States dispute that, saying the Taiwan Strait is an international waterway.

The US Navy regularly sails through the strait to assert freedom of navigation rights. Other allied nations, like Canada, Germany and Britain have also carried out similar missions, to the anger of Beijing.

Taiwan has also been worried about China’s use of its coast guard in recent war games, and is especially concerned Taiwanese civilian ships may be boarded and inspected as Beijing seeks to assert legal authority in the strait.

Taiwan’s coast guard, in a report to parliament on Wednesday, said if that happened its ships would respond under the principle of “neither provoking nor backing down” and stop such acts “with all its strength.”

A massive fire is ripping through a protected wetland in New Zealand, threatening its delicate ecosystem and the rare species that live there – some found nowhere else on Earth.

The blaze at the Waikato wetland on the country’s North Island is 15 kilometers (nearly 10 miles) in perimeter and has burned more than 2,471 acres (1,000 hectares) since it began on Monday, authorities said, as they warned it could take days to bring under control.

Experts have also warned of the potential damage to what is one of New Zealand’s largest carbon sinks – environments, such as oceans and forests, that remove more carbon dioxide from the atmosphere than they contribute, and are critical to slowing global warming and other impacts of the climate crisis.

About 50 firefighters are working alongside helicopters and airplanes at the site south of Auckland, the country’s largest city, according to Fire and Emergency New Zealand (FENZ). There is no immediate danger to residents and businesses in the area, authorities said.

“This is a large fire and it could take some days to bring it under control properly,” said Incident Controller Mark Tinworth in a news release on Wednesday.

The presence of peat – the accumulation of dead and slowly decaying plant material common across bogs and wetland – had made the fire “particularly challenging,” as it can burn underground and can be hard to find and extinguish, he added.

The blaze poses a major risk to the wetland ecosystem, an important habitat that’s found in few other places, experts say. The wetland is a patchwork of swamps, bogs, marshes and open water surrounding two rivers – designated as one of three nationally significant sites in the government’s wetlands restoration program.

Part of the Ramsar List, an international treaty that aims to protect important wetlands, it’s also a breeding site for threatened bird species.

The wetland is also home to various other rare fish and plants, he added, such as the endangered swamp helmet orchid – which isn’t found anywhere else in the world.

Fragile ecosystem

It’s not yet clear where or how the fire started, and investigators are on the scene to determine its origin.

But even before the blaze, the Waikato wetland, like many other unique habitats in New Zealand, was at risk due to environmental degradation and the climate crisis.

It has been “dramatically changed” over the years due to human land use, increased flooding, and the introduction of non-native species, according to the Department of Conservation – damaging the ecosystem’s health and its ability to perform crucial functions.

The wetland is a type of raised peat bog – a “very rare habitat” and “one of the few remaining in the southern hemisphere,” Jones, from the department, told RNZ.

Carbon sinks are critical to slowing global warming and other impacts of the climate crisis; for instance, the Amazon rainforest, long known as the “lungs” of the planet, holds the equivalent of 15 to 20 years of the entire world’s global carbon stores.

But when these carbon sinks come under threat, that stored carbon can be released back into the environment. The Amazon is already beginning to collapse and is now releasing more carbon than it absorbs, mainly because of forest fires and logging.

As the fire burns it’s too soon to assess the extent of its damage or impact on the ecosystem, Jones told RNZ. However, he added, “this fire will be releasing some of the stored carbon back into the environment.”

There are other challenges too – authorities warned members of the public not to fly drones near the fire on Wednesday after the sighting of one forced firefighters to temporarily halt operations, due to the risk of a mid-air collision.

“This is a really beautiful part of the country with considerable environmental value, and we’re doing our best to prevent it from being destroyed,” FENZ’s Tinworth said in a separate release on Tuesday.

There is growing intelligence that North Korea has been readying itself for a more direct role in Russia’s war in Ukraine, a move that could reverberate far beyond the frontlines of the war raging in Europe.

Both Ukraine and South Korea have claimed that North Korean troops were dispatched to Russia for training with the aim of being deployed to Ukraine.

Russia and North Korea have denied the reports, while South Korea has hinted that any deployment could cause it to reassess what level of military support it gives Ukraine.

In recent months, Moscow and Pyongyang have deepened their anti-United States military partnership and the growing alliance has concerned officials in Kyiv and Washington.

Here’s what we know.

Are North Koreans in Ukraine?

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has repeatedly warned that North Korean troops are joining Russia’s war, telling a NATO summit last week that “10,000” soldiers and technical personnel were being prepared.

On Tuesday, the president said in his evening address that Ukraine had intelligence about Russia “training two military units from North Korea” involving perhaps “two brigades of 6,000 people each.” Zelensky also told reporters that Ukraine has seen North Korean “officers and technical staff in the temporarily occupied territories” and believes Russia is “preparing a grouping” to enter Ukraine.

Meanwhile, South Korea’s spy agency, the National Intelligence Service (NIS), said Friday that North Korea has shipped 1,500 soldiers, including special forces fighters, to Russia for training.

What’s North Korea’s relationship with Russia?

Russia and North Korea, both pariahs in the West, have forged increasingly friendly ties since Moscow’s invasion.

In June, the two nations signed a landmark defense pact and pledged to use all available means to provide immediate military assistance in the event the other is attacked.

Multiple governments have accused Pyongyang of supplying arms to Moscow for its grinding war in Ukraine, a charge both countries have denied, despite significant evidence of such transfers.

The arms shipments, which include thousands of metric tons of munitions, have helped Russia replenish its dwindling stockpiles in a war where Ukraine’s forces have long been outgunned and outmanned. Meanwhile, cash-strapped North Korea is believed to have received food and other necessities in exchange.

The hermit nation also seeks to advance its space, missile and illegal nuclear programs.

What has the reaction been?

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has dismissed the allegations that North Korean personnel had been sent to help Russia as “another hoax.”

When asked directly by reporters on Monday whether Moscow was sending North Korean troops to fight in Ukraine, Peskov said that North Korea is a “close neighbor” and the two states were “developing relations in all areas.”

“This cooperation is not directed against third countries,” he said.

North Korea called the claims “groundless, stereotyped rumors,” during a UN General Assembly meeting Monday.

But Seoul is not taking this lightly.

On Monday, its Foreign Ministry summoned the Russian ambassador and urged an “immediate withdrawal of North Korean troops.”

South Korean First Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Kim Hong-kyun warned the alleged deployment violates UN Security Council resolutions. The National Security Office held an emergency meeting to discuss a possible South Korean response.

Following the meeting, Kim Tae-hyo, the first deputy director of national security, said the government would implement “phased countermeasures” according to the “progress of the military cooperation between Russia and North Korea.”

It is unclear what the measures would be, but a South Korean government official said that they are preparing “diplomatic, economic and military measures.”

As North Korea is in the “preliminary stage of deploying troops to Russia,” South Korea is assessing whether it will proceed to “actual combat participation,” the government official added.

“We are developing scenarios to understand the potential impacts North Korea and Russia’s actions could have on us,” the government official said.

Seoul, one of the world’s largest arms suppliers, has provided humanitarian aid and financial support to Ukraine, while joining Western sanctions against Moscow. But it has has not directly provided lethal weapons to Kyiv due to arms export controls to countries at war.

The stakes are high.

North and South Korea are separated by one of the world’s most militarized borders and remain technically in a state of war. Relations between the two have deteriorated in recent years with an uptick in fiery rhetoric on both sides of the demilitarized zone.

The US has not publicly confirmed the North Korean troop deployment, saying it is “continuing to look into the reports.” A State Department spokesperson said Tuesday that if true, “it certainly would mark a dangerous and highly concerning development” and that the US would continue to consult with its allies “on the implications of such a dramatic move.”

But British Defense Minister John Healey told Parliament Tuesday “it is now highly likely that the transfer of hundreds of combat troops from North Korea to Russia has begun.”

What’s the significance?

Any intervention by North Korea could be a watershed moment. The isolated and heavily sanctioned regime taking a role in a major international conflict on the other side of the world is something it has not done in decades.

The state has one of the largest militaries in the world, with 1.2 million soldiers, but many of its troops lack combat experience.

Analysts say the North Korean regime would have a lot to gain from deploying troops, including giving its forces battlefield experience and technical training. The arrangement could also help North Korea gain real-world intelligence on the functioning of its weaponry.

“The special forces troops will come back with live battlefield experience, live infiltration experience against an alerted combat opponent. That makes them more dangerous,” said Carl Schuster, former director of operations at the US Pacific Command’s Joint Intelligence Center.

“I think Kim is providing the troops to gain the resources he needs to sustain the regime, and lessons learned that he might apply if he thinks the conflict is coming in the peninsula,” he added.

Those deployed would be special “elite” forces rather than conventional troops, analysts say.

“If they succeed there, they will get not only firsthand battle experience, but international recognition. So, this could be a real serious problem for the entire world,” Chun said.

“What if the North Koreans make this a habit? What if they become a base for supplying well-trained soldiers? The potential of this deployment should be very concerning.”