SEOUL – The continued build-up of  a “non-regional” military presence in Northeast Asia and nuclear forces in South Korea is “unacceptable,” a high-ranking member of the Russian government said on Wednesday.

The comments follow months of increased tensions between North and South Korea, frequent U.S.-led military exercises in or around the Korean Peninsula, and a U.S. nuclear-capable intercontinental ballistic missile test.

“We object to the use of North Korean nuclear-missile undertakings as a pretext for a mass build-up of non-regional military presence in Northeast Asia,” Secretary of the Russian Security Council Nikolay Patrushev told the Interfax news agency on Wednesday.

“‘Pumping’