Coronavirus: S. Korea Confirms 893 Cases; To Scale Back Military Exercises with US

Secretary of Defense Mark Esper said on Monday (February 24) the United States and South Korea are considering scaling back joint military exercises due to coronavirus concerns.

Speaking to reporters at a joint press conference at Pentagon with his South Korean counterpart Jeong Kyeong-doo, Esper said the US commander of US forces in Korea, Gen. Robert Abrams, and South Korea’s chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Park Han-ki, “are looking at scaling back the command post training due to concerns about the coronavirus.”

Esper said the U.S. and South Korean officers will address any concerns and “will remain fully ready to deal with any threats that we might face together.”

The South Korean defense minister Jeong Kyeong-doo , speaking through an interpreter said “The situation is quite serious” in Korea, due to coronavirus concerns, adding that the combined exercises may have to be “curtailed.”

He also said, General Abrams and General Park are working on the issue, noting that they “will find out the situation and decide how we are going to conduct our exercise,”.

Coronavirus is surging in South Korea, Iran, and Italy after it emerged in China in December.

Beijing has been grappling with its spread in the time since and has reported more than 2,600 deaths amid an economic slowdown prompted by efforts to curtail the disease.

According to the South Korean Yonhap News Agency on Tuesday (Feb. 25) the country has so far reported 893 confirmed cases after reporting its first one on Jan. 20.

“Nine people have died as of Tuesday due to medical complications caused by the novel coronavirus.” said the agency. (AA)