China News Service, May 8 (Xinhua), South Korea's "Central Daily News" reported that under the situation of the new crown epidemic, the United States is still constantly pressing South Korea to increase the amount of defense costs. A senior US government official said on the 6th local time that the US had asked the South Korean government to increase the amount of defense charges to about 1.3 billion US dollars. This amount is about 50% higher than the total amount agreed upon in the last special agreement on the sharing of defense costs between South Korea and the United States. The South Korean government said that it was "unreasonable and uncommon."
Another person related to the US government said, "We have shown great flexibility in recent weeks and expect South Korea to show some flexibility," and did not deny the news of "requesting South Korea to share $ 1.3 billion."
Observations believe that the United States may have requested this amount of money to South Korea early last month. At that time, before the Korean service personnel of the US military in South Korea entered the state of unpaid leave, US President Trump rejected South Korea and the United States "suspended compromise plan (up by about 13%)."
On April 2, US Secretary of State Pompeo spoke with South Korean Foreign Minister Kang Jinghe, and four days later US Secretary of Defense Mark Esper and South Korean Defense Minister Zheng Jingdou made a phone call. Therefore, some analysts believe that the United States may have proposed a $ 1.3 billion allocation plan to South Korea at this time.
In response, the South Korean government stated that the US $ 1.3 billion requirement was still “unreasonable and uncommon.” An official from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of South Korea stated on May 7 that “we cannot disclose the specific amount requested by the US, but even if it is (1.3 billion US dollars), it is not at a level acceptable to South Korea.”
Prior to Kang Jing and April 28 to participate in the congressional inquiry meeting, on the "13% increase plan", she said "this is the upper limit we can accept."
According to the report, it was pointed out that the current psychological war between South Korea and the United States is very similar to the situation during the negotiation of the 10th special agreement on the sharing of defense costs between South Korea and the United States.
When the 10th special agreement on Korea-U.S. Defense fee sharing was negotiated in 2018, the United States originally requested South Korea to increase the amount of assessment to US $ 1 billion. In December of that year, it suddenly requested an increase to US $ 1.25 billion. The situation is the same this time. Therefore, some analysts believe that Trump really hopes that South Korea ’s annual share should be between 1.2 billion and 1.3 billion US dollars.
From September 2019, South Korea and the United States started the 11th defense fee sharing agreement negotiation, but after seven rounds of negotiations, the two sides did not reach an agreement until March this year. The 10th Korea-US defense fee sharing agreement expired at the end of last year.
As negotiations on the sharing of defense costs between South Korea and the United States have been unsuccessful, the United States decided to impose unpaid leave on more than 4,000 Korean workers in the US military base in South Korea from April 1.