Seoul signs deal on US troops

US, NKorea officials to meet ahead of summit

SEOUL, Feb 10, (Agencies): Officials signed a short-term agreement on Sunday to boost South Korea’s contribution toward the upkeep of US troops on the peninsula, after a previous deal lapsed amid US President Donald Trump’s call for the South to pay more.

About 28,500 US troops are stationed in South Korea, where the United States has maintained a military presence since the 1950-53 Korean War.

The new deal must still be approved by South Korea’s parliament, but it would boost its contribution to 1.03 trillion won ($890 million) from 960 billion won in 2018.

Unlike past agreements, which lasted for five years, this one is scheduled to expire in a year, potentially forcing both sides back to the bargaining table within months.

“It has been a very long process, but ultimately a very successful process,” South Korean Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-wha said at a meeting before another official from the foreign ministry initialed the agreement.

While acknowledging lingering domestic criticism of the new deal and the need for parliamentary approval, Kang said the response had “been positive so far”.

The US State Department senior adviser for security negotiations and agreements, Timothy Betts, met Kang before signing the agreement on behalf of the United States, and told her the money represented a small but important part of South Korea’s support for the alliance.

“The United States government realises that South Korea does a lot for our alliance and for peace and stability in this region,” he said.

The allies had struggled to reach a breakthrough despite 10 rounds of talks since March, amid Trump’s repeated calls for a sharp increase in South Korea’s contribution.

South Korean officials have said they had sought to limit its burden to $1 trillion won and make the accord valid for at least three years.

A senior South Korean ruling party legislator said last month that negotiations were deadlocked after the United States made a “sudden, unacceptable” demand that Seoul pay more than 1.4 trillion won per year.

But both sides worked to hammer out an agreement to minimise the impact on South Koreans working on US military bases, and focus on nuclear talks ahead of a second US-North Korea summit, Seoul officials said.

The disagreement had raised the prospect that Trump could decide to withdraw at least some troops from South Korea, as he has in other countries like Syria. But on Sunday, South Korea’s foreign ministry said in a statement that the United States had affirmed it would not be changing the scale of its troop presence.

Meanwhile, the United States and North Korea will meet again this month in an unidentified Asian country ahead of their leaders’ planned second summit in Vietnam in late February, South Korean officials said Sunday.

The US special representative for North Korea, Stephen Biegun, visited Pyongyang last week to work out details of the Feb 27-28 summit in Hanoi between President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

After being briefed by Biegun about his discussions in North Korea, South Korea’s presidential office said that the US and North Korea used Biegun’s trip as a chance to explain what concrete steps they want from each other.