South Korea on Tuesday displayed some of its newly purchased US-made F-35 stealth fighter jets for the first time during its Armed Forces Day ceremony, a development that will likely infuriate rival North Korea.
Under its biggest-ever weapons purchase, South Korea is to buy 40 F-35 fighter jets from Lockheed Martin by 2021.
The first few batches of the aircraft arrived in the South this year.
North Korea has sharply reacted to the deliveries, calling them a grave provocation that violate recent inter-Korean agreements aimed at lowering military tensions.
On Tuesday, President Moon Jae-in reviewed military planes including an F-35, missiles and artillery systems that were displayed on the ground at the start of the ceremony at an air base in southeastern South Korea.
Moon and other top officials later watched three F-35s and other warplanes flying in close formation one after another.
In a televised speech during the ceremony, Moon said he felt "secure about the might of our military armed with new equipment such as F-35As that we disclosed for the first time."
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