Text Fwd: S. Korea, U.S. defense chiefs to discuss N. Korea concerns

Yonhap News
S. Korea, U.S. defense chiefs to discuss N. Korea concerns
By Kim Deok-hyun

SEOUL, Jan. 14 (Yonhap) - The South Korean and U.S. defense chiefs were to discuss concerns about North Korea on Friday and how to further strengthen their deterrence against the increasingly belligerent communist state, Seoul's defense officials said.

After visiting China and Japan this week, U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates was due to meet with South Korean Defense Minister Kim Kwan-jin in Seoul for talks centered on flaring tensions following North Korea's deadly bombardment of a South Korean island in November.

Gates' brief stop in Seoul is also aimed at underscoring Washington's firm alliance with Seoul, to be displayed through joint military exercises this year, officials said.

"During the talks, Secretary Gates will brief the results of his visits to China and Japan to Minister Kim. They will also assess recent activities by North Korea," said a senior official at the South's defense ministry.

Kim and Gates "will reaffirm the principle that the allies will strongly respond if North Korea provokes again and discuss measures to strengthen deterrence against the North," the official said on the condition of anonymity.

The official said Gates' visit to Seoul, the final leg of his week-long Asian tour, is loaded with "symbolic meanings" in demonstrating the solid alliance between South Korea and the U.S.

Tensions have remained acute since North Korea launched an unprovoked artillery attack on Yeonpyeong Island near the Yellow Sea border on Nov. 23, killing two marines and two civilians.

The bombardment came just eight months after North Korea sank a South Korean warship in the Yellow Sea, in which 46 sailors died. Pyongyang denies the ship sinking accusation.

In Tokyo, Gates pushed for Japan's more active role in regional security to defuse tensions on the Korean Peninsula and counterbalance China's fast-growing military capability.

Speaking to reporters in Beijing, Gates offered a blunt new assessment of North Korea's threat, anticipating that Pyongyang will likely possess intercontinental ballistic missiles within five years and pose a "direct threat" to the U.S.

The U.S. stations 28,500 troops in South Korea, a legacy of the 1950-53 Korean War against communist North Korea that ended with an armistice, not a peace treaty.

kdh@yna.co.kr