The South Korean and Australian defense chiefs said on Wednesday that Seoul was in talks to join the defense technology pillar of the AUKUS security pact – just weeks after Japan also said it was in talks to join.
“At today’s meeting, we discussed the possibility of cooperating with AUKUS Pillar II,” South Korean Defense Minister Shin Won-sik said through an interpreter when asked about the pact at a live-streamed joint press conference after a meeting between the South Korean and Australian Ministers of Defense and Foreign Affairs in Melbourne. “We are pleased that members consider Korea as a Pillar II partner.”
The AUKUS pact, announced in 2021, involves Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States. The primary goal of the grouping, known as Pillar I, is widely seen as a means to counter China’s growing military power in the Indo-Pacific region and is to provide Australia with its own fleet of nuclear-powered attack submarines.
