South and North Korea breached the armistice agreement by flying drones across the inter-Korean border last December, said the United Nations Command on Thursday. South Korea disputed the UNC’s conclusion, saying that sending drones to North Korea after Pyongyang’s infiltration was carried out in “self-defense,” which is not restricted by the armistice agreement. The special investigation team ...

The South Korean military on Thursday has publicly conceded overall defects in its counter-unmanned aircraft operations and the absence of real-time information-sharing between the army and air forces on airborne objects. The forces initially failed to recognize the urgency of the situation and communicated via wire-tapped phone calls when North Korean unmanned aerial vehicles infiltrated South ...

Satellite imagery showed “dramatic and ongoing” construction in North Korea’s main missile and rocket launching station on the west coast, a Washington-based think tank said Tuesday, noting that the site could be used for a satellite launch “in the near future.” The construction activities have taken place throughout the eastern and central sections of the Sohae Satellite Launching Station in th...

The United States’ transfer of its munitions stockpiles in South Korea to Ukraine will not affect the readiness posture of the US Forces Korea, the US Department of Defense said Thursday. The Pentagon underscored that the diversion of munitions stored in South Korea is in line with the Pentagon’s efforts to quickly provide ammunition, materials, capabilities, and equipment to Ukraine for use in ...

South Korea’s Foreign Ministry summoned a senior Japanese diplomat on Friday over Japan’s repeated attempt to recognize gold and silver mines on the island of Sado, where Koreans were forced to work during World War II, as a World Heritage site. “The Korean government regrets that the Japanese government resubmitted the nomination of ‘Sado Island Gold Mines,’ for the inscription on the UNESCO Wo...

A publisher of a leading academic journal has rejected a request to retract a controversial paper, which claimed that “comfort women” were voluntary prostitutes, although historians have agreed that suggested evidence does not overturn historical consensus that Korean women were forced into sexual slavery for the Japanese military. Mark Ramseyer, Mitsubishi professor of Japanese legal studies at...

But the commission underlined that the US and South Korea should deliberately maintain strategic ambiguity about the timeline and scope of weapons such as low-yield nuclear submarine-launched cruise missiles or gravity bombs. “The committal, physical steps would only be pursued if North Korean threat levels continued to escalate after other options to strengthen extended deterrence were exhauste...

A US Forces Korea service member has died from a fall in the southern county of Chilgok, North Gyeongsang Province, police and the provincial fire station headquarters said Wednesday. The 28-year-old woman was found dead at the parking lot of her residence at 3:03 a.m. on Wednesday in the town of Waegwan, where the US Army base Camp Carroll is located, according to local media reports. The US s...

South Korea’s homegrown KF-21 fighter jet flew at supersonic speeds for the first time, leading the way for South Korea to become one of only a few countries that have indigenously produced and flown advanced supersonic fighter jets. A KF-21 Boramae fighter prototype took off for its first-ever supersonic test flight on Tuesday at 2:58 p.m. at the base of South Korea’s Air Force 3rd Training Win...

The South Korean and US defense chiefs will meet in Seoul before the end of next month to discuss ways to reinforce the alliance’s deterrence and readiness against escalating North Korean threats and enhance trilateral security cooperation with the US and Japan. US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin is likely to visit Seoul before the allies stage a tabletop exercise, or TTX, to simulate North Ko...

History of defense cooperation South Korea and the UAE have redoubled efforts to reinforce military cooperation and boost defense industry cooperation in recent years. For the first time in September 2022, South Korea’s Air Force participated in the annual multilateral Falcon Shield exercise, which is led by the UAE and aims to test and improve the synergy of air and missile defense capabilitie...

Eyes are riveted on whether North Korean leader Kim Jong-un will convey another key message on the country’s nuclear buildup and hard-line foreign policy at a parliamentary meeting scheduled to be held this week. But experts have said the focus of the meeting is to discuss key domestic issues, including annual economic plans and the state budget, as well as preparations for nationwide events mark...

Meanwhile, the Defense Ministry also shared the plans to enhance the South Korea-US alliance’s readiness and deterrence against escalating North Korean nuclear and missile threats. South Korea’s Defense Ministry and the US Defense Department are set to stage a tabletop exercise, or TTX, in February in the US, the first of its kind since September 2021, to come up with optimal policy response in ...

North Korea will never compromise or concede on the fundamental interests and sovereignty of the country despite any challenges, North Korean state media said Tuesday, legitimizing the ruling party’s intransigence and determination to stand against foreign powers. In an article, the Rodong Sinmun, an organ of the ruling Workers’ Party of Korea, echoed the country’s principle of strength-for-stre...

South Korea’s Defense Ministry on Monday said that the military’s response to the cross-border infiltration by North Korean drones did not breach the armistice agreement, stressing that the countermeasure was essential to its right of self-defense enshrined in the UN Charter. The ministry’s argument counters that of the main opposition Democratic Party of Korea, which said that the South Korean ...