Military leaders of South Korea and the United States will hold a meeting this week to discuss their joint defense posture against North Korean threats and the future joint operation structure, military officers said Wednesday. South Korean Army Gen. Jung Seung-jo, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS), and his U.S. counterpart, Army Gen. Martin Dempsey, will sit down via a video conference for the 37th Military Committee Meeting (MCM) on Thursday. During the annual meeting, they are expected to review joint defense capabilities against North Korea amid heightened tensions on the Korean Peninsula after a series of the North's warlike rhetoric and actions following fresh U.N. sanctions against its Feb. 12 nuclear test and the Seoul-Washington annual military drills in March. Right after the meeting, the two military chiefs plan to issue a joint statement on the security situation on the Korean Peninsula, according to the officers.
