S Korean FM meets with Senior US Official over N Korea, bilateral alliance

South Korean Foreign Minister Kim Sung-hwan and US Deputy Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter met Thursday and discussed the bilateral alliance and policy cooperation and coordination on North Korea, ministry officials said. Carter arrived in Seoul on Wednesday for a two-day visit and plans to meet with South Korean Defense Minister Kim Kwan-jin and other high-ranking officials at the presidential office later in the day. The foreign minister and Carter discussed "outstanding issues related to the bilateral alliance, including the work on the transfer of wartime operational control, an assessment of the situation in North Korea and cooperation on North Korea policy," South Korean News Agency (Yonhap) quoted a senior ministry official as saying. North Korea's young leader Kim Jong-un assumed power last December shortly after the death of his father, long-time ruler Kim Jong-il. South Korea and the US have called for the North's new leadership to give up its policy of provocations and improve the lives of its own people, but there have been little signs that Pyongyang may change its course. The new leader was given the title of marshal last week, the highest functioning military rank, after sacking his army chief Ri Yong-ho, in what many analysts view as a move to further tighten his grip on power.