North Korea's denuclearization remains a top priority for the United States despite Pyongyang's unwillingness to give up its nuclear weapons program, a senior U.S.official said Monday.   "Denuclearization remains our top priority," Rose Gottemoeller, U.S. under secretary of state for arms control and international security, told reporters in a conference call from Tokyo. "We remain in close contact with other five party partners on our shared goal of the denuclearization of the Korean peninsula

South Korea and Mongolia held working-level defense talks in Ulaanbaatar Monday to discuss regional security issues, including North Korea's nuclear weapons program, the Defense Ministry said.  The ministry said that Yoon Soon-ku, the ministry's director general on international policy, met with his Mongolian counterpart, Zagdsuren Boldbaatar, in Mongolia's capital to discuss a follow-up to a meeting between their defense chiefs held in May last year and how to enhance defense cooperation.  Yoon

A Seoul court Friday sentenced a former major who was part of an anti-espionage military body to 18 months in prison for smuggling strategic arms into Lebanon.  Judge Lee Ki-lee of the Seoul Central District Court handed down the ruling, convicting the man, identified by his surname Lee, of smuggling about 47,000 M-16 and AK-47 magazines to Lebanese military supplies importers.   Lee met the importers while dispatched to Lebanon as part of the Defense Security Command rom 2007 to 2008. After lea

The number of laboratories affected by live anthrax shipments from the U.S. has risen to 193 in the U.S. and eight in foreign countries, but none of the newly added labs are in South Korea, the U.S. Defense Department said Thursday.Of the total, 87 were primary labs that received live anthrax spores directly from a Defense Department lab in Utah, while the other 106 labs are secondary labs that received samples from the primary labs, according to a Pentagon website on the issue.Affected by the m

By Shin Hyon-hee South Korea and the U.S. carried out a joint on-site inspection at Osan Air Base on Thursday over the shipment of a potentially live anthrax sample which has kindled safety concerns and calls for an amendment of the agreement on the stationing of American troops here. In late May, 22 U.S. servicemen were identified as having possibly come into contact with the lethal bacteria “inadvertently” sent by a military laboratory in Utah to the base located in Gyeonggi Province. Though t

The U.S. Forces Korea will step up transparency in running biological defense programs in South Korea, the USFK said Thursday, as the allies expand their probe into the live anthrax shipment to a U.S. base here.Earlier in the day, the joint South Korea-U.S. team in charge of investigating the shipment conducted an on-site inspection of Osan Air Base, where a sample of live anthrax spores was inadvertently shipped. It was the first investigation by the joint working group at the base since the Pe

The Army on Tuesday began deploying next-generation multiple launch rocket systems as part of Seoul’s efforts to better counter growing North Korean artillery threats and boost home production of tactical weapons. The domestically built MLRS, named “Chunmoo,” is poised to beef up South Korea’s artillery counterstrike capabilities with a range of up to 80 kilometers, more than twice that of the existing “Guryong.” The Defense Agency for Technology and Quality has injected some 131.4 billion won (

Six South Korean fighter jets departed for Alaska on Tuesday to join a U.S.-led air defense drill designed to beef up joint combat capacity, the Air Force said.The six F-16Ds were to arrive at Eielson Air Force Base, Alaska, later in the day to join the Red Flag Alaska exercise, which will kick off Aug. 10 for a 12-day run, the Air Force said in a statement.A total of 103 South Korean forces, including 32 combat pilots, will join the joint combat training exercise, commanded by the U.S. Pacific

South Korea and the U.S. are well equipped to detect any signs of a North Korean missile launch despite the reported cover being installed over the North Korean launching pad, the Defense Ministry said Monday.Japan's Kyodo News reported earlier in the day that the North is installing a cover over the Tongchang-ri rocket launch pad to "evade surveillance by spy satellites."The cover will make it difficult for South Korea and the U.S. to catch any missile assembly activities inside, Defense Minist

South Korea will hold a working-level defense policy meeting with Japan this week to discuss regional security and cooperation on the defense segment, the Defense Ministry said Monday.The 21st round of the South Korea-Japan working-level defense policy conference will be held Wednesday at the ministry in Seoul, with the South Korean side headed by Yoon Soon-ku, the ministry's director general on international policy, and the Japanese side headed by his counterpart, Atsuo Suzuki, the ministry sai

Scud missiles fired into Saudi Arabia by Yemeni rebels in recent months came from North Korea, a South Korean intelligence official said Wednesday, in the latest case that illustrated North Korea's support for the weapons programs of some countries in the Middle East.Saudi Arabia has shot down about 40 percent of some 20 Scud missiles fired by Yemen's Houthi rebels, said the official, who is familiar with the issue.He did not give further details on how South Korea reached the conclusion that th

South Korea will complete a major upgrade on the home-grown dual-barrel K-11 rifle by the end of 2016, the head of the state defense development agency said Wednesday, after the use of the Army assault rifle was suspended last year due to a glitch in the shooting control system."(We) are pushing to improve the K-11 dual-barrel rifle by a large scale before the end of next year in order to turn what has become an ugly duckling into a swan in the shortest time possible,"Jung Hong-yong, president o