WASHINGTON, July 11 (Yonhap) -- The Senate-proposed U.S. defense budget bill for next year calls for further strengthening the alliance with South Korea, including through the deployment of the THAAD missile defense system, congressional records showed Tuesday.
The National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2018, which was introduced by Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, on Monday, has a section devoted to the "importance of alliance" between the U.S. and the South.
In the section, the legislation (S.1519) explains the seriousness of the nuclear and missile threats North Korea poses while listing a series of provocations by Pyongyang, such as its 2010 sinking of a South Korean warship and the shelling of a South Korean island.
Last year's bill had no such section.
The conduct of the North "poses an imminent threat to the security of the United States and its allies" as well as to the global economy, the safety of members of the U.S. armed forces, the integrity of the global financial system and the integrity of global nonproliferation programs, the bill said.
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