By Jung Sung-ki
Staff Reporter
The Ministry of National Defense is considering taking back some arms acquisition functions from the Defense Acquisition Program Administration (DAPA), Defense Minister Kim Tae-young said Tuesday.
The move is part of efforts to overhaul the country's defense acquisition mechanism currently handled by the independent arms agency launched in 2006, following a series of corruption scandals related to arms procurement.
In a news conference, Kim said his ministry is reviewing two options: either direct ministerial control of DAPA, or taking back some of the acquisition power from the agency.
For the first option, the ministry is considering creating the post of second vice defense minister to handle arms acquisition, officials said.
Otherwise, an arms acquisition director would be named at the ministry to better coordinate with the DAPA commissioner, they said.
President Lee Myung-bak called for measures to overhaul the current acquisition programs solely handled by DAPA.
In December, the ministry created a task force to spearhead acquisition reform.
On North Korea, the minister said Pyongyang has increased its naval exercises near the western sea border since a naval skirmish with South Korea in November.
In the gunfight, a North Korean sailor was reportedly killed and three others were wounded, while there were no South Korean casualties. The North vowed to take "merciless" military action against the South.
"Our military is monitoring North Korea more closely than before," he said. "North Korea's navy and air force are conducting their annual training exercises."
North Korea often offers an olive branch on the one hand and make provocative moves on the other, so South Korea's military is fully preparing for such ducal tactics, the minister said.
On Monday, Pyongyang proposed to hold talks over a peace regime to replace the current armistice treaty signed at the end of the 1950-53 Korean War. The ceasefire treaty was signed by the U.S.-led United Nations Command on one side, and China and North Korea on the other.
Kim said discussions on the establishment of a peace treaty should be made after progress is made at six-party talks to convince the North to give up its nuclear weapons program.
He said South Korea must be involved in talks over a peace treaty though the country had not been a direct participant in the armistice agreement.
Members of the six-party talks, the two Koreas, the United States, China, Japan and Russia, agreed to discuss the treaty as part of efforts to bring the permanent peace to the Korean Peninsula.