Russia claims to detain Ukrainian agent as key suspect in deadly car bombing

Russia's FSB security service says it has detained a suspect over the car-bomb killing of a senior Russian military officer.

The Kremlin blamed Ukraine for the Friday explosion, which killed Yaroslav Moskalik, a deputy head of the Russian armed forces.

There was no official comment from Kyiv on the 59-year-old's death.

The FSB named the suspect as Ignat Kuzin, saying he was "an agent of the Ukrainian special services".

Disputes over Russia's Kursk border claim

Nearly nine months after losing chunks of the Kursk region to a surprise Ukrainian incursion, Russia announced that its troops had fully reclaimed the border territory.

Kyiv denied it, saying the fighting was still ongoing in Belgorod, another Russian region bordering Ukraine.

But if confirmed, Moscow's victory in Kursk would deprive Kyiv of key leverage in US-brokered efforts to negotiate an end to the more than three-year-old war by exchanging its gains for some Russian-occupied land in Ukraine.

Russia also confirmed for the first time that North Korean soldiers have been fighting alongside Russian troops in Kursk, with the chief of the military General Staff praising their "heroism" in helping to drive out the Ukrainians.

Ukrainian forces seized a swathe of territory in Kursk region last August in a surprise incursion that embarrassed Russia's Vladimir Putin.

Russian forces have been trying to drive them out ever since.

Mr Putin, speaking amid rising efforts by the Trump administration to end the war, said the expulsion of Ukrainian forces from Russian soil opened the way for further Russian successes inside Ukraine.

"The Kyiv regime's adventure has completely failed," Mr Putin said in video footage released by the Kremlin that showed him receiving a report from the head of Russia's general staff, Valery Gerasimov.

"The full defeat of the enemy in the Kursk border region creates conditions for further successful actions by our forces on other important parts of the front," he added.

14,000 North Korean troops on the ground, Ukraine says 

North Korea sent an estimated total of 14,000 troops to fight alongside the Russian Army, Ukrainian officials said.

Lacking armoured vehicles and drone warfare experience, they took heavy casualties but adapted quickly.

Russia had previously neither confirmed nor denied the presence of North Korean troops in Kursk.

Russia's military relationship with North Korea has grown rapidly since Moscow became internationally isolated after invading Ukraine in February 2022.

Kyiv says North Korea has supplied Russia with artillery shells as well as rocket systems, thousands of troops and ballistic missiles, which Moscow began using for strikes against Ukraine at the end of 2023.

Russia and North Korea have denied weapons transfers, which would violate UN embargoes.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy had hoped his forces' seizure of Russian territory would give him a bargaining chip in any future talks to end the war in his country.

Mr Zelenskyy held what the White House described as a "very productive" meeting with US President Donald Trump on Saturday in Rome, where both leaders were attending the funeral of Pope Francis.

Trump is pressuring Mr Zelenskyy to agree to give up some Ukrainian territory to help end the three-year war that has caused large-scale casualties and devastation in cities, towns and villages across Ukraine.

Reuters/AP