Slop.

I know they've been accused of hiding the deaths of international mercenaries in the past but can't think of any specific recent crisis they'd need to do propaganda for in that regard. The fog of war makes piecing this together hard. My best guess is that it's racist propaganda to downplay strong Russian recruitment of its Asian minority groups while the Ukrainian TCC can't kidnap enough medically disqualified grandpas to replace its casualties/rotate its forces. I've read that for groups like the Yakuts the amount of money the Russian military is paying can be generational wealth. Maybe there is some North Korean attache learning how to counter NATO weapons, but the big PR crisis they face is the manpower shortage and downplaying Russia's ability to win a war of attrition domestically. Calling those minority groups North Koreans seems like it's World War 3 baiting with the "impossibly weak but impossibly strong" boogeyman.