The Pentagon said on Tuesday (June 2) that it had accepted a proposal from South Korea for it to temporarily fund thousands of Korean workers at US bases who were put on unpaid leave this year.
The United States furloughed the workers in South Korea in April after both allies failed to sign a new cost-sharing agreement.
In a statement, the Pentagon said the agreement meant South Korea would pay more than US$200 million (S$279 million) to fund 4,000 Korean workers through to the end of this year.
"This decision enables a more equitable sharing of the employee labour burden by the ROK and the US," the Pentagon said, referring to South Korea by the initials of its official name, the Republic of Korea.
"More importantly, it sustains the Alliance's number one priorityour combined defense posture," it said.
South Korea's Ministry of Defence said it welcomed the Pentagon's decision to end the furlough for the workers.
The ministry said South Korea would work with the US to reach an agreement "as soon as possible" on the broader cost-sharing arrangement, which remains in dispute after it lapsed at the end of the previous year, leading to the workers being furloughed in the first place.
South Korea and the US are embroiled in a disagreement dating back nearly two years over how much each should pay to support the roughly 28,500 US troops stationed in South Korea, a legacy of the 1950-53 Korean War that ended in an armistice, rather than a peace treaty.
"The United States has shown considerable flexibility in their approach to the SMA (Special Measures Agreement) negotiations, and requests that the ROK does the same," the Pentagon said.
US officials have told Reuters that before South Korea's parliamentary elections in April, President Donald Trump rejected a South Korean offer to increase its contribution by at least 13 per cent from the previous accord.
A union representing the Korean workers issued a statement welcoming the Pentagon's decision, and called for institutional changes to prevent the situation from happening again.