한미정상회담 열흘 앞두고 외교안보인사들 잇따라 미국행
With just ten days left until what could be another historic summit between Presidents Moon and Trump, the top diplomats of South Korea and the U.S. are also busy holding an array of meetings.
Our Park Hee-jun now walks us through the significant meetings we should keep tabs on prior to the April 11th summit.
The second deputy chief of the National Security Office, Kim Hyun-chong, is in Washington to discuss the agenda for the upcoming Moon-Trump summit with his counterpart Charles Kupperman.
"It's my first trip to the U.S. since taking this post. I'm here to fix the agendas for the summit with my NSC counterpart on Monday."
Kim will also meet members of Congress to share the stance of the South Korean government,...as well as ask for their support in the ongoing peace efforts on the Korean Peninsula.
South Korea’s defense minister Jeong Kyeong-doo is also set to meet acting U.S. Secretary of Defense Patrick Shanahan the same day,... to draw up defense strategies to help revive the denuclearization talks.
This will be the first meeting between the two since Shanahan took up the role last December.
They're expected to review their latest Dong Maeng joint exercise that replaced the larger-scale Key Resolve exercise,... and discuss the direction of future combined drills.
Also on the table is the eventual transfer of wartime operational control to South Korea.
And they're likely to go over the progress made on implementing the inter-Korean military agreement signed by the two Koreas in Pyeongyang last September.
Last week, Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-wha also had a face-to-face with U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.
"We share the same priority of maintaining the momentum in North Korea-U.S. dialogue. We need to keep watching the North's movements."
It's widely seen that the upcoming Moon-Trump summit will show their strong bilateral ties,... and dispel any concerns of a weakening South Korea-U.S. alliance.
Park Hee-jun, Arirang News.
