A warning that a nuclear strike would bring about the end of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has been removed from a still-unreleased joint security statement between South Korea and the United States.

Multiple military sources said Friday that the statement resulting from the 57th Security Consultative Meeting(SCM) between the defense chiefs of the two allies omits the language that a nuclear attack "would result in the end of the Kim regime," which previous statements have included.

The phrase "end of the Kim regime" was first included in the 2022 SCM joint communique during the Yoon Suk Yeol administration and appeared in each annual statement until last year.

The deletion of a direct warning to North Korea likely reflects President Lee Jae Myung's aim to ease cross-border tensions and U.S. President Donald Trump's desire to resume dialogue with Kim.

This year's statement is also expected to reaffirm a commitment to keeping U.S. Forces Korea(USFK) in place to deter all regional threats, signaling Washington's agreement to sustain USFK's presence on the peninsula, but will omit a vow to maintain the current force level that has appeared in past releases.

The two sides plan to issue a joint fact sheet containing the results of their August and October summits before releasing this year's SCM joint communique.