S. Korea says it will build nuclearpowered submarines at home

AFP | Seoul

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South Korea will build its nuclear-powered submarines at home, the defense minister said on Tuesday, with a plan to launch its first vessel in the mid-2030s.

Seoul is seeking to bolster deterrence against nuclear-armed North Korea, with the South set to join a small circle of countries that operate nuclear-powered submarines after receiving US approval for the supply of restricted nuclear fuel.

“We will develop and build nuclear-powered submarines with our own technology to launch the first vessel in the mid-2030s,” Defense Minister Ahn Gyu-back told a defense strategy meeting attended by President Lee Jae Myung.

Ahn said the first submarine would enter operational service “in the latter half of the 2030s.”

South Korea has long sought to acquire nuclear-powered submarines to counter North Korea’s growing military threats, although it had been constrained by a nuclear cooperation agreement with the United States.

Lee said in November Seoul had received Washington’s approval for the construction of nuclear-powered submarines as part of a long-awaited security and trade agreement.

That included US approval for uranium enrichment and reprocessing spent fuel.

However, there had not yet been any firm indication about where the submarines would be built, with Trump saying they would be built “right here in the good ol’ USA..”