by Joseph Yun Li-sun

June 12, after almost 6 years, ministerial level talks between the two Koreas will resume. On the table the reopening of the Kaesong industrial complex and the possible resumption of family reunions. No military officers in North’s delegation.

Seoul (AsiaNews) - After months of military and political tension, the two Koreas have agreed to return to the table of peaceful dialogue. Seoul and Pyongyang have agreed to hold a ministerial-level meeting on 12 June in the capital of the South for the first time since 2007.

The parties have agreed to postpone to a later discussion ongoing "technical details" after the three sessions (morning, afternoon and evening) at Freedom House, on the South Korean side of the security zone of the village of Panmunjom, and another late night session that unlocked the situation.

According to Yonhap news agency the head of the South Korean delegation will be Unification Minister, Ryoo Kihl-jae, his counterpart should be Kim Yang-gon, at the head of the Workers Party United Front. The Southern based conservative newspaper Chosun Ilbo, said: "If confirmed, the North's delegation will not include any military personnel. A choice that could show an end of the rule of the generals in Pyongyang."

Unification Ministry spokesman Kim Hyung-seok said that "the talks were conducted in a climate in which both sides wanted to keep to be cooperative and not too negative, as indeed befits an operational level contact".

The inter-Korean relations have experienced moments of high tension since last March, when joint military exercises between Washington and Seoul (announced a year in advance) were defined by Pyongyang as "a provocation and a rehearsal for attack against us." In addition, the Security Council of the United Nations unanimously adopted - even with China's vote - a series of economic sanctions to punish the third nuclear test conducted by the regime on February 12.

Pyongyang, bent by an economic crisis that is worsening with each passing year, last week proposed normalizing operations at the joint industrial zone in Kaesong - where work had been unilaterally interrupted by the regime - and to launch a series commercial and humanitarian initiatives, including sightseeing tours to Mount Kumgang and the reunion of families separated by the Korean War of 1950-53.

At the worst of the crisis, the bishops of South Korea stressed the importance of a return to peaceful dialogue and clarified - through the President of the Bishops' Conference - that Pyongyang was attempting "blackmail dictated by despair."

 

• KOREA
• Seoul
• Pyongyang
• negotiations
• diplomacy