US, S.Korean defense chiefs hold meeting
( 2003-11-17 13:46) (Xinhua)
US Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and South Korea Defense Minister Cho Young-kil started the annual Security Consultative Meeting (SCM) earlier Monday Seoul amid local anti-war demonstrations, reported the South Korean national Yonhap News Agency.
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| Protesters shout a slogan during a rally opposing the visit of U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to South Korea , in front of Seoul military airport Sunday, Nov. 16, 2003. [AP] |
During a brief photo session, Cho reminded that it was Rumsfeld 's first visit to South Korea since he became the US defense secretary almost three years ago.
The two senior military officials then held a closed door one- on-one meeting which lasted 35 minutes, 20 minutes longer than originally planned. After that they were joined by 10 aides from each side.
Details of the talks were not available, but the two defense chiefs were scheduled to hold a joint news conference later Monday.
Before the opening of the meeting, 70 local anti-war activists made demonstration outside the Defense Ministry building. They demanded Rumsfeld go back, said Yonhap.
Just before Rumsfeld's arrival, South Korea decided to limit the size of its planned additional troop dispatch to Iraq to 3,000, most of which are non-combatants. Previously, the US hoped Seoul would dispatch a large number of combatant troops to the Middle East country.
South Koreans are sharply divided over whether to send additional troops to join its several hundreds of army engineers and medics deployed in Iraq earlier this year.
Also high on the agenda of the meeting is the planned relocation of the US military command out of Seoul by 2006. The allies in June agreed to consolidate or reposition other US bases in South Korea, which could possibly result in a US troop reduction.
Washington now stations some 37,000 troops in South Korea.
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