Seoul: South Korea`s Army named its first female combatant general on Thursday when it promoted a female soldier to the post, the Defence Ministry said.
Army Col Song Myung-soon at the Joint Chiefs of Staff was promoted to brigadier general, according to the ministry. South Korea`s military has turned out five female generals since 2001, but all of them were from the nurse corps.
Song, 52, was commissioned into the Women`s Army Corps in 1981 after her graduation from Yeungnam University with a bachelor`s degree in political science and foreign affairs. She holds a graduate degree in national security from Kyonggi University.
She has served as a commander of the special forces and a battalion commander in the Women`s Army Corps and worked in the Combined Forces Command.
The first woman to become a general-grade officer in South Korea was Brig Gen Yang Seung-sook, former chief of the Armed Forces Nursing Academy, who achieved the rank in 2001 and retired in 2004.
PTI
