South Korea's acting president urged ministries on Monday to work with the U.S. to avoid any negative impact on science, technology and energy cooperation after the U.S. Department of Energy designated South Korea a 'sensitive' country.

The US added South Korea to a list of so-called sensitive countries for energy cooperation in January after a security breach came to light, according to South Korea’s Foreign Ministry.

South Korea was designated a “sensitive” country by the U.S. Department of Energy because visitors to DOE-affiliated labs “mishandled sensitive information,” Joseph Yun, the acting U.S. ambassador to South Korea,