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The U.S. will accept Korea¡¯s request to hand over wartime operational control of Korean troops to Seoul only in 2012, not 2009 as Washington had hoped. In return, Washington is asking Seoul to guarantee it will not change its mind again no matter who wins the presidential election here in December. That would put paid to hopes in Korea that a new president could postpone the handover.
A government source on Thursday said Korea and the U.S. will highly likely agree on the exact timing of the handover in bilateral defense ministerial talks on Friday. The U.S. is asking Korea for ¡°tangible measures¡± to earn its trust, citing Korea¡¯s earlier failure to immediately implement a bilateral agreement when the situation changed. By tangible measures, the U.S. appears to mean establishing a military command that would take charge of troop control, and an earlier start to drawing up new military strategies once Combined Forces Command is dismantled, according to sources.
(englishnews@chosun.com )
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