靑 "트럼프 '주한미군 감축검토' 명령 사실아냐"... 펜타곤 "변함 없다"
South Korea's Blue House has dismissed reports that claim U.S. President Donald Trump is looking at options to reduce U.S. troop numbers in South Korea.
This comes weeks before President Trump's landmark meeting with North Korea's leader Kim Jong-un.
Kwon Jang-ho has the details.
Seoul's Presidential office has described reports that U.S. President Donald Trump had requested plans to reduce American troop numbers in South Korea as 'not true'.
The Blue House's senior press secretary Yoon Young-chan released a statement on Friday saying that President Moon's national security adviser Chung Eui-yong, currently in Washington to meet with his U.S. counterparts, had discussed this report with a key member of the U.S. National Security Council who flatly dismissed it as "groundless."
The U.S. Defense Department also said it has not received any orders to withdraw troops from the Korean Peninsula, and is maintaining the same posture in the region.
The New York Times on Thursday quoted several unnamed officials, who said Trump had ordered the Pentagon to draw up such plans.
The review is said not to be intended as a bargaining chip for North Korea's denuclearization in Trump's upcoming summit with Kim Jong-un, but it is being considered as an option if a peace treaty on the Korean peninsula is reached.
Although the sources declined to confirm whether Trump was considering a full withdrawal, they said it was unlikely.
Trump has long criticized the costs of stationing the 28-thousand-500 troops in South Korea, saying that Seoul needs to pay more towards those costs.
In March he even suggested during a fundraising speech that he wanted to pull out troops in order to balance out the trade deficit.
Currently South Korea pays around 820-million dollars a year towards troop costs, about half of the total cost of stationing U.S. forces on the peninsula, but that amount is expected to increase with Seoul and Washington currently in negotiations over a new deal.
Kwon Jang-ho, Arirang News.
