The United States and its staunch ally South Korea began a joint military exercise on Monday amid heightened tensions in the Korean peninsula following repeated threats by North Korea against the two countries, media reports from Seoul said.
Militaries of the two countries kicked off the drill dubbed 'Key Resolve' to confirm their chains of command and prepare their armed forces to meet any threat from the Communist North which has been reeling under fresh rounds of U.N. sanctions in response to its last month nuclear testing.
The two-week computer simulated exercise involves 10,000 Korean forces and 3,500 American personnel to test various scenarios in which South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) plays a leading role in conducting operations, the reports said.
The drill begins on the day when North Korea declared that all non-aggression agreements with Seoul have been scrapped.
South Korea said on Monday that the belligerent North cut off the telephone lines between the liaison offices of the two Koreas in the border village of Panmunjom. It has alerted areas near the armistice line and at sea west of the Korean peninsula, citing the possibility of the North conducting military drills.
North Korea has expressed anger over the new Security Council sanctions in the wake of its third nuclear test and the ongoing U.S.-South Korea military drills.
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