photo credit: Yonhap News
First Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Cho Hyun-dong said in relation to the Korea-U.S. Extended Deterrence Strategy Consultative Group (EDSCG) meeting, “We will try our best so that the public can feel that it is more strengthened and upgraded than the extended deterrence measures we have seen so far.”
First Vice Minister Cho, who visited the United States to attend the EDSCG scheduled for the 16th, met with reporters at Dulles Airport near Washington DC on the 14th local time and said, “There is such a thing as strategic asset deployment, and the level and breadth of it may be different from the past. Please keep that in mind and watch over it,” he said.
“As North Korea announced the enactment of its nuclear force policy just a few days ago, it is different from the past,” said Vice Minister Cho.
“I plan to hold a meeting with the hope that North Korea will be able to reassure the people who are worried about the North Korean threat and deliver a meaningful message,” he said.
“I think it would be a desirable outcome if we could prevent North Korea from conducting a nuclear test through a message of extended deterrence,” he said.
The EDSCG is a vice-ministerial level consultative body where the diplomatic and defense authorities of South Korea and the United States discuss the effective operation of extended deterrence in a ‘2+2’ format. no see.