US, S Korea to suspend drills during Olympics

TheUnited States and South Korea agreed yesterday to delay their jointmilitary exercises until after the Winter Olympics next month in anapparent move to de-escalate tensions with Pyongyang.  Theannouncement came just hours after US President Donald Trump said thathigh-level talks set for next week between North and South Korea were “agood thing”. Tensions have spiralled in recent months after NorthKorea held multiple missile launches and its sixth and most powerfulnuclear test – purportedly of a hydrogen bomb.  Trump has also tradedpersonal insults with his North Korean counterpart Kim Jong-un, rattlingregional allies.  But the last few days has witnessed a raresoftening of tone on both sides of the demilitarised zone after Kimoffered an olive branch to Seoul during a New Year’s speech, saying hewas willing to send a team to next month’s Winter Olympics in the South. Thetentative rapprochement took a further step on Thursday after SouthKorean president Moon Jae-in spoke to Trump by telephone with bothagreeing to suspend joint military drills, a regular source ofPyongyang’s ire.  “The two leaders agreed to de-conflict theOlympics and our military exercises so that United States and Republicof Korea forces can focus on ensuring the security of the Games,” theWhite House said in a statement. Moon’s office said the South Koreanpresident told Trump that delaying the exercises would help ensure thesuccess of the Winter Olympics — being hosted by the South next month inPyeongchang — “in case the North does not make any more provocations”.Aftera year that saw tensions on the Korean peninsula spike to their worstlevels in years, 2018 has begun on a tentatively warmer note with Seoulresponding positively to Kim’s New Year speech.  On Wednesday thetwo Koreas restored a cross-border hotline that had been shut down since2016. They also agreed to hold high-level talks next week — the firstsince 2015 — which will focus on “matters of mutual interest”, includingthe North’s participation in the Winter Olympics.  North Korea’syoung leader has shrugged off a raft of new sanctions and heightenedrhetoric from Washington as his regime drives forward with its weaponsprogrammes, which it says are meant to defend against US aggression. WhileTrump called the talks a “good thing” in a tweet on Thursday, hisambassador to the United Nations, Nikki Haley, struck a much morecautious tone earlier in the week. “We won’t take any of the talksseriously if they don’t do something to ban all nuclear weapons in NorthKorea,” she said on Tuesday. A State Department spokeswoman alsowarned that Pyongyang’s olive branch may be an attempt to “drive a wedgeof some sort” between Washington and Seoul.  The White Housestatement announcing the suspension of drills said both Trump and Moon“agreed to continue the campaign of maximum pressure against North Koreaand to not repeat mistakes of the past”. Pyongyang’s missile andnuclear tests has seen the isolated state slapped with painful newsanctions that even its key ally China have backed.  But South Koreaand Washington’s regular joint military drills have also beencriticised by some as adding to regional tensions, particularly byBeijing and Moscow who have both called for them to be suspended. Russia’sdeputy foreign minister Sergei Ryabkov on Thursday said he “welcomed”the halting of drills during the Olympics. News agency RIA Novostiquoted him as saying that Moscow “observes with satisfaction” that theircalls to halt the manouevres have been “taken into account”. Kim’s NewYear address also included a warning to the US that he has a “nuclearbutton” on his table, prompting a furious response from Trump viaTwitter that Washington’s nuclear button was “much bigger and morepowerful”. The tweet generated responses both on Twitter and from analysts largely of scorn and alarm.