hankyoreh

US Assistant Secretary of Defense for Asian and Pacific Security Affairs

A senior Pentagon official hinted that South Korea, the US, and Japan are looking to sign an additional agreement that would go beyond the MOU that the three countries signed in December of last year, in which they agreed to share intelligence about the North Korean nuclear weapons and missile programs.

The comments were made by David Shear, US Assistant Secretary of Defense for Asian and Pacific Security Affairs, during the US-Japan Security Seminar 2015 on Mar. 27, which was hosted in Washington, D.C., by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS).

Speaking about the trilateral information sharing arrangement, Shear said, “We strongly welcomed the conclusion of the trilateral information sharing agreement among Korea, Japan and the US. I think there are opportunities for further such arrangements. I think we have to be realistic and patient in how we approach this, given the sensitivities.”

“But we‘ve seen, as we’ve worked through the information sharing agreement, that trilateral cooperation is quite possible and [. . .] I think you will find us looking for further opportunities, not yet defined, to cooperate trilaterally.”

Shear‘s remarks are thought to hint that the US means to push once more for the military secrets protection agreement between South Korea and Japan that was abandoned in 2012 after closed-door negotiations between the two countries.

The trilateral information-sharing agreement that was signed in Dec. 2014 is limited to the threats posed by North Korea’s nuclear weapons and missile programs, and it only enables information specified by South Korea and Japan to be shared with the US. For this reason, the agreement is not wholly satisfactory to the US, which wants the three countries to share all their military intelligence with each other.

The US appears to be pursuing this agreement because it has concluded that building a trilateral missile defense system will require sharing relevant information between the three countries in real time.

Shear also emphasized that improving relations between South Korea and Japan is important for strengthening security cooperation in the Asia-Pacific region. While describing the trilateral information-sharing agreement as a “good first step,” he said that more progress must take place inside a future-oriented cooperative relationship between South Korea and Japan.

By Park Hyun, Washington correspondent

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