South Korea relies on the U.S. for 95 percent of its intelligence capabilities, a former ROK defense ministry official said in a conference on Thursday.

"We (South Korea) have to particularly increase our intelligence capability because 95 percent relies upon the United States, I think," Hong Kyu-dok, former Deputy Minister for the Defense Reform Office at the Ministry of National Defense, said in a Korea Economic Institute panel at the Association for Asian Studies Conference held in Chicago.