U.S. Vice President Mike Pence, left, shakes hands with U.S. Gen. Vincent Brooks, commander of the United Nations Command, US Forces Korea and Combined Forces Command before a dinner with soldiers and family members after Easter Sunday church services at a military base in Seoul, South Korea, Sunday, April 16, 2017. Pence said Sunday that North Korea’s “provocation” underscored the risks faced by American and South Korean service members, hours after the North conducted a failed missile launch shortly before Pence’s arrival. (Lee Jin-man/AP)
U.S. Vice President Mike Pence, center, lays a wreath at the Seoul National Cemetery in Seoul, South Korea, Sunday, April 16, 2017. Pence arrived in South Korea on Sunday to begin a 10-day trip to Asia that comes amid turmoil on the Korean Peninsula over North Korea’s threats to advance its nuclear and defense capabilities, and just after a failed missile launch by the North. (Lee Jin-man/AP)
U.S. Vice President Mike Pence speaks during a dinner with soldiers and family members after Easter Sunday church services at a military base in Seoul, South Korea, Sunday, April 16, 2017. Pence said Sunday that North Korea’s “provocation” underscored the risks faced by American and South Korean service members, hours after the North conducted a failed missile launch shortly before Pence’s arrival. (Lee Jin-man/AP)
U.S. Vice President Mike Pence, second from right, and his wife Karen pay a silent tribute at the National Cemetery in Seoul, South Korea, Sunday, April. 16, 2017. Pence arrived in South Korea on Sunday to begin a 10-day trip to Asia that comes amid turmoil on the Korean Peninsula over North Korea’s threats to advance its nuclear and defense capabilities, and just after a failed missile launch by the North. (Ahn Young-joon/Pool, AP)
A submarine missile is paraded across Kim Il Sung Square Saturday, April 15, 2017, during a military parade in Pyongyang, North Korea to celebrate the 105th birth anniversary of Kim Il Sung, the country’s late founder and grandfather of current ruler Kim Jong Un. (Wong Maye-E/AP)
CAMP BONIFAS, South Korea — The Latest on U.S. Vice President Mike Pence in South Korea (all times local):
Pence arrived at Camp Bonifas on Monday morning for a briefing with military leaders and to meet with American troops stationed there. He is in South Korea as part of a 10-day tour of Asia.
The joint U.S.-South Korean military camp is just outside the 2.5-mile-wide DMZ. Pence’s visit, full of Cold War symbolism, comes amid increasing tensions and heated rhetoric on the Korean Peninsula.
Pence has called North Korea’s failed missile launch a “provocation,” and President Donald Trump tweeted Sunday that China is working with the U.S. on the “North Korea problem.”
8 a.m.
President Donald Trump is asserting that China is working with the United States on “the North Korea problem.”
His vice president, Mike Pence, is telling American and South Korea service members that the North’s latest “provocation,” a failed missile launch shortly before his arrival in Seoul, has laid bare the risks they face.
While the North did not conduct a nuclear test, the specter of a potential escalated U.S. response is trailing Pence as he undertakes a 10-day trip to Asia amid increasing tensions and heated rhetoric.
Trump’s national security adviser, H.R. McMaster, is citing Trump’s recent decision to order missile strikes in Syria after a chemical attack blamed on the Assad government as a sign that the president “is clearly comfortable making tough decisions.”
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