Senior defense officials of South Korea, the United States and Japan will hold trilateral talks later this month, Seoul's defense chief said Thursday, as the three nations seek to bolster security cooperation against military threats from North Korea.
Defense Minister Lee Jong-sup confirmed that the deputy minister-level trilateral meeting will take place this month when asked by Rep. Kim Young-bae of the Democratic Party during a session of the National Assembly's defense committee.
Lee did not elaborate on the meeting's possible agenda, but it is expected to focus on ways to respond to North Korea's evolving nuclear and missile threats, such as three-way sharing of missile warning data.
The three countries' leaders agreed to share North Korean missile warning data in real time during a trilateral meeting in Cambodia in November last year.
During the parliamentary session, Vice Defense Minister Shin Beom-chul rejected some opposition party lawmakers' claims that South Korea sharing missile warning data with Japan would only benefit Tokyo, calling it a "misunderstanding" or a "distortion."
"As we are closer in the early stage of a (North Korean) missile launch, there are more advantageous aspects in terms of (accuracy)," Shin told lawmakers. "But the (missile's) point of impact can be more accurately assessed when farther away."
"North Korea's recent ballistic missiles have made irregular (trajectory) maneuvers when making impact, and security cooperation between South Korea, U.S. and Japan is needed in such areas," he said.
Source: Yonhap News Agency