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South Korea to pay more for US troops

Monday, 11 February 2019



SEOUL, Feb 10 (AP): South Korea and the United States struck a new deal on Sunday that increases Seoul's contribution for the cost of the American military presence on its soil, overcoming previous failed negotiations that caused worries about their decades-long alliance.
South Korea last year provided about $830 million, covering roughly 40 per cent of the cost of the deployment of 28,500 US soldiers whose presence is meant to deter aggression from North Korea. President Donald Trump has pushed for South Korea to pay more.
On Sunday, chief negotiators from the two countries signed a new cost-sharing plan, which requires South Korea to pay about 1.04 trillion won ($924 million) in 2019, Seoul's Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
The statement said the two countries reaffirmed the need for a "stable" US military deployment amid the "rapidly changing situation on the Korean Peninsula."