South Korean President Lee Myung-bak called yesterday for beefing up the country's military and strengthening ties with the US to deter any aggression from North Korea.
"Strengthening defense capability and becoming a strong army means we should win a war in the event it breaks out," Lee told top military leaders at an army headquarters south of Seoul, South Korean pool reports said.
"Our greater role is to prevent a war," he said.
Lee, a conservative who has pledged to take a tougher line on the North's nuclear threat, also said the South Korea-US alliance is "very important" to deter aggression from Pyongyang.
He expressed pride that the Seoul area has developed into a world-class metropolis "despite facing the North's military -- one of the world's strongest -- only 40 miles [60km] away."
Under the government of Lee's liberal predecessor -- former president Roh Moo-hyun -- South Korea agreed to retake wartime operational control of its 680,000-member military from the US by 2012.
The US also plans to reduce its troops level in South Korea to 25,000 by December from the current 28,500 under a global troop realignment program.
The US troop-reduction plans stoked security jitters among many South Koreans who argue that a nuclear-armed North Korea still poses a formidable treat to South Korea. The US says the introduction of sophisticated weapons would offset the reduced boots on the ground.
Regaining military wartime command was key to Roh's drive to seek an equal footing in relations with the US, which took full operational control of the South Korean military shortly after the Korean War broke out in 1950. South Korea took back the peacetime control in 1994 but the wartime operational control still lies in the hands of the chief of US troops here.
Under Roh's government, South Korea's ties with the US also underwent tense moments mainly because of Roh's engagement policy with the North.
Lee, who took office last month, has said he will restore frayed ties with Washington. His aides have indicated they will seek to delay the schedule for the wartime control transfer.
During Roh's tenure, South Korea also began downsizing its military troop levels.
Yemen’s separatist leader has vowed to keep working for an independent state in the country’s south, in his first social media post since he disappeared earlier this month after his group briefly seized swathes of territory. Aidarous al-Zubaidi’s United Arab Emirates (UAE)-backed Southern Transitional Council (STC) forces last month captured two Yemeni provinces in an offensive that was rolled back by Saudi strikes and Riyadh’s allied forces on the ground. Al-Zubaidi then disappeared after he failed to board a flight to Riyadh for talks earlier this month, with Saudi Arabia accusing him of fleeing to Abu Dhabi, while supporters insisted he was
‘SHOCK TACTIC’: The dismissal of Yang mirrors past cases such as Jang Song-thaek, Kim’s uncle, who was executed after being accused of plotting to overthrow his nephew North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has fired his vice premier, compared him to a goat and railed against “incompetent” officials, state media reported yesterday, in a rare and very public broadside against apparatchiks at the opening of a critical factory. Vice Premier Yang Sung-ho was sacked “on the spot,” the state-run Korean Central News Agency said, in a speech in which Kim attacked “irresponsible, rude and incompetent leading officials.” “Please, comrade vice premier, resign by yourself when you can do it on your own before it is too late,” Kim reportedly said. “He is ineligible for an important duty. Put simply, it was
The Chinese Embassy in Manila yesterday said it has filed a diplomatic protest against a Philippine Coast Guard spokesman over a social media post that included cartoonish images of Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平). Philippine Coast Guard spokesman Jay Tarriela and an embassy official had been trading barbs since last week over issues concerning the disputed South China Sea. The crucial waterway, which Beijing claims historic rights to despite an international ruling that its assertion has no legal basis, has been the site of repeated clashes between Chinese and Philippine vessels. Tarriela’s Facebook post on Wednesday included a photo of him giving a
Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa on Sunday announced a deal with the chief of Kurdish-led forces that includes a ceasefire, after government troops advanced across Kurdish-held areas of the country’s north and east. Syrian Kurdish leader Mazloum Abdi said he had agreed to the deal to avoid a broader war. He made the decision after deadly clashes in the Syrian city of Raqa on Sunday between Kurdish-led forces and local fighters loyal to Damascus, and fighting this month between the Kurds and government forces. The agreement would also see the Kurdish administration and forces integrate into the state after months of stalled negotiations on
RSS