South proposes liaison office meeting with North this week

The two Koreas are likely to hold a meeting at their joint liaison office in the North‘s border town of Kaesong this week to discuss follow-up steps on last month’s summit agreement, a unification ministry official said Thursday.

South Korea has proposed holding a meeting on Friday between Vice Unification Minister Chun Hae-sung and his North Korean counterpart, Jon Jong-su, who are serving co-heads of the liaison office.

“We are waiting for the North‘s response,” the ministry official told reporters on the condition of anonymity.

When the two Koreas launched the liaison office on Sept. 14, they agreed to hold a meeting between their co-heads every week, but due in part to scheduling problems, they have held only two face-to-face meetings since its opening. They last met in late September. 

South Korean President Moon Jae-in and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un met for their third summit in Pyongyang last month.

In a follow-up, the two Koreas held a high-level meeting earlier this week and agreed to hold a ground-breaking ceremony for modernizing and connecting railways and roads over their border in late November or early December. They also promised to hold Red Cross talks in November and arrange general-level military talks at an early date.

“We expect that details may be determined (with regard to those meetings and their schedules) when the vice minister goes up (to the liaison office),” the official said.

He said that Unification Minister Cho Myoung-gyon is likely to meet a group of North Korean defectors next week and that relevant efforts are currently under way.

The meeting appears to be aimed at assuaging concerns among the community of North Korean defectors over Cho’s controversial decision on Monday to exclude a defector-turned-journalist from covering inter-Korean talks.

The official also said inter-Korean negotiations are under way to prepare for the performance of a North Korean artistic group in Seoul this month.

The official said that the two Koreas have been discussing comprehensive details of a North Korean art troupe performance in Seoul in October, including schedule, place, route of travel and period of stay.

The official said the working-level discussions are being conducted through document exchanges.

At a summit in Pyongyang last month, South and North Korea agreed to further promote cultural and artistic exchanges and to stage a performance of Pyongyang‘s art troupe in Seoul in October this year.

Asked if the planned performance would take place during October, the official said, “Preparations are proceeding that way.

But we are watching how progress will be made due to tight conditions.”

The official added it is too early to say whether the North Korean art troupe will also perform in other South Korean cities. (Yonhap)