MOSCOW, October 20 (RIA Novosti) - US Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel and his South Korean counterpart Han Min-koo will meet in Washington on October 23 to discuss the transfer of wartime operational command to Seoul, the South Korean Defense Ministry said Monday.
During the annual Security Consultative Meeting, the two defense chiefs are to specify terms of Seoul's assuming wartime control over its combined forces with the United States, Xinhua news agency quoted the ministry as saying.
The potential threats posed by South Korea's northern neighbor and a deterrence strategy to counter North Korea's nuclear program will be among other issues on the agenda.
A "two-plus-two" meeting, comprising the heads of the US and South Korean defense ministers, US Secretary of State John Kerry and South Korean Foreign Minister Yun Byung-se is reportedly scheduled for the same day.
Seoul handed over the wartime control of its military forces to Washington during the 1950-1953 Korean war. In 1994, South Korea redeemed command over peacetime operations.
South Korea was due to be handed over wartime operational control over combined forces back in 2007, but the transfer was postponed until the end of 2015, following North Korea's third nuclear test in 2013.
