The announcement came amid a heightened standoff over North Korea's nuclear weapons programs following Pyongyang's announcement last week that it has nuclear weapons and was boycotting U.S.-sponsored nuclear disarmament talks.

The exercise was scheduled ahead of the North Korean statement, said Kim Yong-kyu, a spokesman for the U.S. military command in Seoul.

The drill is of "small-scale" involving only dozens of soldiers, he said.

"The exercise is just one of many joint U.S.-South Korean military exercises, and has nothing to do with that statement," Kim said.

Kim declined to give further details.

South Korea's Yonhap news agency, quoting sources in the South Korean Defense Ministry, reported that the U.S. and South Korean soldiers will train in attacking enemy targets with air-force assistance.

North Korea routinely condemns joint military exercises between the United States and South Korea, calling them preparations to invade the communist state.

The Korean Peninsula remains in a state of war following the 1950-53 Korean War that ended in a cease-fire, not a peace treaty. About 33,000 of U.S. troops are based in the South.

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