US President Donald Trump said on Tuesday the United States was stopping "very provocative" and costly military exercises with South Korea to facilitate denuclearisation negotiations with North Korea.

The United States and its ally South Korea hold regular military exercises to the fury of North Korea, which has long seen the drills as preparations to invade it.

"The war games are very expensive, we pay for the majority of them," Trump told a news conference in Singapore after a historic summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

"Under the circumstances, that we're negotiating ... I think it's inappropriate to be having war games."

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