Defense officials of South Korea and the United States have agreed to strengthen their joint response capabilities against threats from North Korea's nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction (WMD), Seoul's defense ministry said Wednesday. Yoon Bong-hee, director-general of the ministry's policy planning bureau, and Richard C. Johnson, U.S. deputy assistant secretary of defense for nuclear and countering WMD policy, led the Counter WMD Committee session in Seoul on Tuesday, according to the ministry. The meeting came amid growing concerns over the illicit arms trade between North Korea and Russia, emboldened by the signing of a mutual defense pact during summit talks between their leaders in Pyongyang last month. "In particular, they concurred that illicit WMD proliferation in the region, including Russia and North Korea's arms trade, hinders peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula, as well as the Indo-Pacific region, and vowed cooperation for WMD non-proliferation," the ministry said in a release . The two sides also agreed to expand the sharing of information and enhance relevant units' expertise through the Cooperative Threat Reduction program, a U.S. security program designed to bolster allies' capabilities against WMD threats. They assessed that a bilateral tabletop exercise earlier this year helped advance their response capabilities against chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear threats, the ministry said. Also discussed in the meeting was the need to cooperate in the event of North Korea's nuclear and WMD attacks and expanding exchanges and cooperation between relevant units for such a purpose. The Counter WMD Committee session is held annually on a rotational basis in Seoul and Washington. Source: Yonhap News Agency