PANMUNJOM, South Korea (Kyodo) Defense Minister Toshimi Kitazawa on Tuesday visited Panmunjom, a village in the Demilitarized Zone between the two Koreas, in a show of Tokyo's security cooperation with Seoul amid continuing tensions on the peninsula.
Kitazawa also visited the South Korean Navy's 2nd Fleet headquarters, which preserves the corvette Cheonan. The ship was raised after being sunk allegedly by a North Korean torpedo last March near the tense western maritime border. The North has denied involvement in the deadly sinking.
"We must brace ourselves (for similar incidents), given there is a neighboring nation that can do things like this without hesitation," Kitazawa said.