The vice-ministerial negotiations began on Friday in the Kaesong joint industrial zone on the North Korean side of the border as part of efforts to implement an inter-Korean deal struck on August 26 to defuse tensions on the Korean Peninsula. “Let’s take a crucial first step to pave the way for reunification”.
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The two Koreas agreed to talks between authorities in late November, while also agreeing on the talks being vice minister-level.
But Kim asserted this week that North Korea had become “a powerful nuclear weapons state ready to detonate self-reliant A-bomb and H-bomb to reliably defend its sovereignty and the dignity of the nation”, while visiting the site of a former munitions factory in central Pyongyang, according to the official Korean Central News Agency.
Jon said the talks were an opportunity to overcome the decades of mistrust and confrontation. “The outcome this time could have a significant impact on the path the overall inter-Korea relationship takes next year”, said Cheong Seong-Chang, an analyst at the Sejong Institute think tank in Seoul.
Although any talks between the two Koreas are welcomed as a positive step, precedent suggests any significant breakthrough is unlikely.
South Korean officials complained of this “unprecedented situation”, and the Northern side returned the computer and the lens after Hwang Chul, the chief representative from the North stepped in.
Hwang Boogi, center, South Korea’s vice minister of unification and the head negotiator for high-level talks with North Korea, speaks to the media before leaving for Kaesong, at the office of inter-Korean Dialogue in Seo… The last round of reunions were held in October but South Korea wants to make the meetings more frequent, as there are more than 60,000 South Koreans on the reunion waiting list.
The cash-strapped North wants the South to resume lucrative tours to its scenic Mount Kumgang resort, which Seoul suspended in 2008 after a female tourist was shot dead by a North Korean guard.
Building trust has been a key feature of the South’s Park Geun-hye administration, which was reportedly hoping to arrange regular family reunions for relatives separated by the closely-guarded border.
Also on Thursday, the UN Security Council held its second meeting on human rights in North Korea, despite the objections of four countries including China, its main diplomatic and economic backer.
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The U.S. ambassador to the U.N., Samantha Power, told the council that the North’s abuses represented a “level of horror unrivalled in the world”.
