US troops have held a joint military exercise with South Korea's army units amid tensions on the Korean peninsula.

US media reports say the huge military drills held on Friday near the South Korean town of Pocheon, located 30 kilometers (18 miles) from the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) dividing North and South Korea, is the largest-ever joint military maneuvers by Washington and Seoul.

US military drills with South Korea has drawn angry responses from the neighboring North, which tends to view these events as a provocation and a prelude to war.

In reaction to the move, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, said on Friday that the recent "landmark" agreement  between Seoul and Pyongyang was the result of his country's nuclear might, according to Pyongyang's KCNA new agency.

The agreement "was by no means something achieved at the negotiating table, but thanks to the tremendous military muscle … for self-defense," Kim is reported to have said at a meeting of the ruling Workers Party.

Panmunjom agreement

Last week, South Korean officials met with the North's ranking authorities in charge of South Korea affairs for talks at the truce village of Panmunjom in the DMZ to discuss ways to decrease rising tensions on the Korean peninsula.

On August 25, Seoul agreed to stop broadcasting propaganda messages into North Korea as part of an agreement to defuse the latest tensions.

For its part, Pyongyang expressed "regret" over a recent landmine explosion that allegedly wounded two South Korean soldiers.

South Korean presidential security adviser Kim Kwan-jin said the two Koreas also agreed to hold talks soon, either in Seoul or Pyongyang, about improving ties 62 years after they ended the Korean War with a truce, not a peace treaty. The two sides said they will resume reunions in September for families separated by the Cold War-era conflict.

The deal was "warmly welcomed" by UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon who voiced hope that it would “serve as a mechanism to effectively manage any problems that may arise on the Korean peninsula." "As secretary general, I stand ready to support inter-Korean cooperation.”

In 1950, US-backed South Korea declared its separation from the North that led to the Korean War, which saw nearly one million South Koreans and over 1.5 million North Koreans lose their lives before an armistice stopped the carnage in 1953.