South Korea, U.S. to hold talks, discuss North Korea

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South Korea, U.S. to hold talks, discuss North Korea

SEOUL, Dec 1 Reuters -- South Korea will broach North Korea separately with two different audiences, holding talks with Beijing's top diplomat in China and visiting U.S. military leaders in Seoul.

In China, talks are expected to include South Korean President Moon Jae-in's hopes for a declaration to end the Korean War between 1950 and 1953.

In Seoul, the top brass of the U.S. and South Korea are expected to discuss ways to strengthen a military alliance whose top goal is to prevent a conflict with Pyongyang, and be prepared to fight one if that fails.

Our mission to ensure peace on the Korean Peninsula remains incomplete. South Korean Prime Minister Kim Boo-kyum, addressing the U.S. and South Korean military leaders in Seoul on Wednesday evening, said there were a lot of tasks ahead of us.

North Korea has so far rebuffed U.S. embarrassments for diplomacy since President Joe Biden took over from Donald Trump, who had three summits with leader Kim Jong Un.

Seoul sees an end to war declaration as a way to build trust with Kim, restart stalled denuclearisation talks and eventually move toward a lasting peace agreement. The conflict ended with an armistice and not a peace treaty.

But Moon, who has been active in trying to engage with North Korea throughout his presidency, is running out of time to reach an agreement before his term ends next year.

South Korea's national security adviser Suh Hoon will head to the Chinese city of Tianjin on Thursday for talks with China's top diplomat Yang Jiechi that will discuss North Korea, South Korea's presidential Blue House said in a statement.

They only have six months left. Yoon Young-kwan Kim Koo, a former South Korean foreign minister, said at a recent forum by the Center for Strategic and International Studies that they don't know whether their efforts will be successful or not.

Critics of Moon's push are concerned about the risk of Pyongyang ending its war declaration without getting anything concrete in return from Kim.

On Wednesday, U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin met Suh when he arrived in Seoul and renewed Washington's commitment to the defense of South Korea in a brief address later.

On Thursday, Austin and the U.S. Army General Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, will attend annual military talks with South Korea. The discussions are expected to include a call to work on a routine update to operational planning for a potential conflict with North Korea.

One U.S. official said it was needed, given the circumstances and new capabilities that the alliances have, given the circumstances and new capabilities.

We do this all the time. North Korea has tested new weapons systems in the past, including a submarine-launched ballistic missile. The head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, IAEA, warned earlier this year, http: www.reuters. North Korea's nuclear program was moving full steam ahead with work on plutonium separation, uranium enrichment and other activities, according to the article northkorea-nuclear-iaea-idINV 9 N 2 IE 02 B. On Wednesday, U.S. Army General Mark Milley met General In-Choul Won, South Korea's chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

Milley emphasized the U.S. commitment to provide extended deterrence to South Korea, a reference to Washington's vow to defend its ally with nuclear weapons if necessary, according to a U.S. statement.

South Korea's efforts to win wartime operational control of combined military forces are one of the issues that are expected to be top of the agenda in Seoul. Currently, a U.S. general would command those forces during a war. The COVID-19 epidemic has delayed progress toward that transition, which has resulted in key military drills and other meetings being cancelled.