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U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth brushed off concerns over a perceived growing rift in the Korea-U.S. alliance as "fake news," Seoul's Defense Minister Kang Shin-chul said Friday after a bilateral meeting with his U.S. counterpart. Kang made the remarks following talks held earlier this week, according to reports from Korea Times and Yonhap. The defense chiefs met in the Philippines on Wednesday for discussions likely centered on narrowing differences over the timing of the wartime operational control (OPCON) transition from Washington to Seoul. President Lee Jae Myung also vowed Thursday to strengthen the alliance during a ceremony marking a Korean War battle, while Foreign Minister Cho Hyun departed for the U.S. for talks with Secretary of State Marco Rubio. Korean media coverage focuses on the official reassurances, with no prominent blogger or café reactions reported in the supplied documents.