SEOUL: South Korea and the United States began annual military exercises on Tuesday following a coronavirus delay, with the drills likely to infuriate the North which has long considered them rehearsals for invasion. The drills come as tensions remain high between Seoul and Pyongyang after the North blew up an inter-Korean liaison office on its side of the border in June and threatened military measures. The nuclear-armed North — which attacked its neighbor in 1950, triggering the Korean War — has regularly been angered by military exercises between the US and the South. The decision to proceed was made “after taking into consideration related circumstances, such as the Covid-19 situation, comprehensively,” it added. The South reported 246 new infections on Tuesday, taking its total to 15,761, the fifth consecutive day of triple-digit increases after several weeks with numbers generally in the 30s and 40s.

Source: Manila Times August 18, 2020 06:45 UTC