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1 1 (April 22, 2020)

handle is hein.crs/govdaac0001 and id is 1 raw text is: -c r s c n ...........~ 10 gm 0 ILI Updated April 22, 2020 South Korea: Background and U.S. Relations South Korea (officially the Republic of Korea, or ROK) is one of the United States' most important strategic and economic partners in Asia. The U.S.-ROK Mutual Defense Treaty, signed in 1953 at the end of the Korean War, commits the United States to help South Korea defend itself, particularly from North Korea (officially the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, or DPRK), and the alliance helps the United States promote its interests in East Asia and around the globe. ROK troops, for example, have fought alongside U.S. troops in U.S.-led military conflicts. Approximately 28,500 U.S. troops are based in the ROK. The economic relationship is bolstered by the U.S.-South Korea Free Trade Agreement (KORUS FTA). South Korea is the United States' seventh-largest trading partner, and the United States is South Korea's second-largest trading partner, behind China. Policy cooperation between the United States and South Korea has been inconsistent under the administrations of Donald Trump and Moon Jae-in. Moon, a progressive, was elected President in May 2017 after a decade of conservative rule. Although the two sides generally have managed to navigate differences, for instance over trade and North Korea policy, underlying tensions continue to surface on a range of issues. Most recently, the U.S.-ROK Special Measures Agreement (SMA) on how to divide the costs of basing U.S. troops in South Korea expired at the end of 2019, and subsequent negotiations have failed to reach a compromise. As a result, about 4,000 South Korean workers on U.S. bases were furloughed in April 2020. The Trump Administration has demanded Seoul increase its payments by 400%, and Trump publicly said it is debatable whether the U.S. troop presence is in U.S. interests. South &Korea's COI D-> 19 Resporse In February 2020, South Korea emerged as the second- worst COVID-19 affected country, after China. By the end of March, however, South Koreans largely had slowed the initial outbreak, and had done so without resorting to large- scale lockdowns. As of April 22, South Korea was reporting fewer than 20 new cases a day, with a cumulative total of over 10,000 infections and over 200 deaths. The significant reduction in newly reported cases allowed the government in mid-April to begin relaxing its social distancing measures. South Korea managed the initial outbreak with aggressive testing, contact-tracing, and public communication. South Korea describes its approach as the three Ts: tracking, testing, and treatment, including caring for mildly symptomatic patients in separate facilities away from families and from hospitals. As of April 21, over 550,000 citizens had been tested for the virus-one of the highest rate of testing per capita in the world-at over 600 sites, including pop-up facilities and drive-through sites that provide rapid results. The government also emphasized transparency, disseminating information about the virus' spread, including about possible infections at the neighborhood level. After a deadly 2015 outbreak of Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) exposed flaws in the country's response, South Korea reformed its health policy by granting the government greater powers to monitor and track individual patients and to allow private companies to produce tests rapidly. U............................... ii ii ii ii ii ii i i ii ii ii ii ii i i ii i i i.. t..:...P.... g * :::. . ::Seoul 6................................ Lr..................nuI;. Vo ..t.. N o................................ North Korea isthedominant.strategic.concern.in.the...- SouthKorearelationship..................Since.. 201, N :::::: :::::: ::::: :::::: :::::: ::::: :::::.................................:: : ... made major strides inits ability to strike,,the .>continental U iite tates ith anuclear-armedballisticmissileWhil e. their ::approaches.differ,.both.Trump.and.Moon.have pursued:rapprochementw.:::...::::ithPyongyansinceearl sumts woei Tum aomnte ithei Moon.eni h .. Howtevterdenuclaizaionealksahe beenisfrozenssinc We Fhebrapro2019, whfeb Trump and 'sseond sumitvi hni DedK without anm aogeemnt Tadhe twoul sspn dislared oeraencoe andsseqening ofd cnaesins seiialNotKoendenuclearization mek.Snethn i a asutresei s.oficilssa Their anorthKeanit counteprshv refuse, toenagerizationtalk neoatiobens Sine Mayc 2019,arthe0DPRKwhasnuctead muliple shcortngeumii baistiee misie tess anelda seubmrine-laucncedos ballistic missile test, in violao of sunmie-Nainshe ballistic issile tes, in violaion of Unied Nation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . S ..0 Q,' . :O NC :,?. %>{i0.

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