The United States and South Korea on Monday launched an 11-day joint naval exercise in the Sea of Japan and the Yellow Sea, as geopolitical tensions continue to escalate in the region.

Vessels from the two allies’ navies will participate in the Maritime Counter Special Operations exercise from October 16 to October 26 to “promote communications, interoperability, and partnership” in the region, a US Navy statement said.

The US military said on Monday that during the exercise, it would also practise evacuating non-combatant Americans out of South Korea in the event of war, The New York Times reported. This particular exercise, called “Courageous Channel”, will take place from October 23.

The annual training exercise is aimed at preparing American “service members and their families to respond to a wide range of crisis management events such as noncombatant evacuation and natural or man-made disasters,” the US military was quoted as saying.

The maritime exercise is a “regular, joint and combined exercise to counter North Korea’s maritime threats”, the Yonhap news agency quoted Vice Admiral Jung Jin-seop of the South Korean Navy as saying.