SEOUL, South Korea (AP) 鈥 South Korean and U.S. troops will begin their large annual joint military drills next week to enhance readiness against North Korean threats, the allies announced Thursday, days after North Korea threatened high-profile provocations against what it called escalating U.S.-led aggression.
However, the announcement was overshadowed by the news of two on a civilian area during a joint live-fire exercise with the U.S. military earlier Thursday.
Eight people were injured and South Korea's military halted all live-fire drills across the country.
The allies have already begun joint field training for the March 10-20 command post exercise dubbed , South Korea鈥檚 Joint Chiefs of Staff said.
The accidental bombing happened during one of the joint training exercises, though there were no U.S. soldiers involved in the incident.
South Korean military spokesperson Lee Sung Joon and his U.S. counterpart, Ryan Donald, told a joint news conference that the training is meant to strengthen their countries' combined defense posture by reflecting evolving challenges such as
Lee said the two allies plan 16 brigade-level field trainings this year, up from 10 such drills last year.
It was unclear how long the live-fire suspension would last. Military officials said they can restart firing exercises once authorities determine the cause of Thursday's accident and take steps to prevent recurrences.
An initial investigation indicated one of the KF-16 pilots had entered wrong coordinates for a bombing site.
North Korea views major as an invasion rehearsal and often reacts with missile tests and fiery rhetoric.
Earlier this week, Kim Yo Jong, the influential sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, accused the United States of intensifying confrontational actions and threatened to ramp up measures 鈥渢hreatening the security of the enemy at the strategic level.鈥 She cited the recent temporary deployments of U.S. strategic assets like and other U.S.-involved military activities.
Observers say North Korea could test-fire powerful designed to strike the U.S. mainland and American military bases in the region.
Since his Jan. 20 inauguration, President Donald again to revive diplomacy. North Korea has not responded to Trump's remarks and says U.S. hostilities against it has deepened since Trump鈥檚 inauguration.
During 2018 and 2019, met three times to discuss potential benefits for North Korea should it return to nuclear disarmament. But their diplomacy eventually fell apart after Trump rejected Kim鈥檚 offer to dismantle his main nuclear complex, a limited denuclearization step, in exchange of extensive sanctions relief.
