The US and South Korea will postpone joint air drills in an “act of goodwill” towards the nuclear-armed North, US Defence Secretary Mark Esper said Sunday, after months of deadlocked diplomacy with Pyongyang.
North Korea has long protested joint military drills, which it condemns as preparations for invasion, and has set Washington an end-of-year deadline to come up with a new offer in deadlocked negotiations on its weapons programmes.
The US and South Korea last year cancelled several joint drills in the wake of the Singapore summit between President Donald Trump and the North’s leader Kim Jong Un, but are due to carry out a combined air exercise later this month.
But the joint air drills set for later this month will now be postponed, Esper said.
“We have made this decision as an act of goodwill to contribute to an environment conducive to diplomacy and the advancement of peace,” he told reporters on the sidelines of a meeting of defence ministers in the Thai capital.
He urged Pyongyang to return to negotiations and “demonstrate the same goodwill as it considers decisions on conducting training, exercises and testing”. Esper said the decision to delay the drills was not a concession but an effort to create “some more space” for diplomats to strike an agreement.