South Korean President Park Geun-Hye said Tuesday she wants talks with North Korea on removing raw materials and finished products from a joint industrial complex closed by military tensions.

In a cabinet meeting, Park instructed the Unification Ministry to offer Pyongyang discussions on the Kaesong complex, which lies 10 kilometers (six miles) inside the North Korean side of the joint border.

South Korea and a U.S. strike force led by the nuclear-powered aircraft carrier USS Nimitz kicked off Monday a joint naval drill slammed by North Korea as a "wanton" provocation and rehearsal for war.

The two-day exercise began with the departure of the 97,000-tonne Nimitz, one of the world's largest warships, from the southern South Korean port of Busan where it had been docked over the weekend, the U.S. navy said in a statement.

North Korea has replaced its hawkish armed forces minister after just six months in the job -- the latest in a long line of top military reshuffles by supreme leader Kim Jong-Un.

The new minister was identified by the Korean Central News Agency on Sunday as Jang Jong-Nam, a relatively young and little-known field commander believed to be in his mid-50s.

North Korea has criticized the arrival of the U.S. aircraft carrier USS Nimitz in the South for a joint drill as an "extremely reckless" provocation and a rehearsal for war against the communist state.

A U.S. naval strike group led by the nuclear-powered Nimitz arrived off the South's southern port of Busan Saturday for the drill to be staged this week, following joint exercises that infuriated North Korea in recent months.

A U.S. naval strike group led by the aircraft carrier USS Nimitz will arrive in South Korea this weekend for sea drills, officials said Friday, following joint exercises that infuriated North Korea.

As well as the nuclear-powered Nimitz, the group includes three guided-missile cruisers and destroyers, the U.S. military said in a statement, without specifying the total size of the group.

South Korea's president on Wednesday proposed an international park on the tense border with North Korea as part of a region-wide peace initiative to put an end to constant cycles of crisis.

In an address to a joint meeting of the U.S. Congress, President Park Geun-Hye warned that the Demilitarized Zone dividing the neighbors was in fact "the most militarized place on the planet" and a risk to the world.

North Korea has taken a major step back from a planned missile test, U.S. officials said, even as Pyongyang and Seoul exchanged fresh threats Tuesday of swift military retaliation to any provocation.

A U.S. defense official said two North Korean missiles -- primed for imminent test firing -- had been moved from their launch site, signaling a possible easing of North Asia tensions ahead of a U.S.-South Korea summit in Washington.

U.N. leader Ban Ki-moon praised the "firm" stance taken by South Korea's new president Park Geun-Hye over provocation by rival North Korea in talks at the U.N. headquarters on Monday, a spokesman said.

North Korea dominated the meeting between the two South Korean officials before Park flies to Washington for her first summit with U.S. President Barack Obama.

North Korea demanded Sunday that South Korea drop all "military provocations" if it wants to revive a jointly-run business estate which has suspended operations amid high military tensions on the peninsula.

The Kaesong Industrial Complex, opened just north of the tense border in 2004 as a rare symbol of cooperation, has fallen victim to the escalating stand-off.

North Korea said Sunday it would not invite any leading U.S. figure to seek the release of a jailed American and he would not become a "bargaining chip" in any political negotiations.

"Some media of the U.S. said that the DPRK (North Korea) tried to use Bae's case as a political bargaining chip. This is a ridiculous and wrong guess," a foreign ministry spokesman told the official KCNA news agency.