Meeting promises thaw in Korea ties

Published on Saturday 22 August 2009 19:51

SOUTH Korea's president Lee Myung-bak will meet a delegation of visiting North Korean officials today, the latest sign that ties between the divided countries are warming.

Relations between Pyongyang and Seoul have been tense since Lee took office in February 2008 and he has not previously held talks with officials from the North.

The meeting with North Korea's spy chief and five other officials will take place at the presidential Blue House, said a spokesman for South Korea's unification ministry, which handles relations with the North.

The North Koreans arrived in Seoul on Friday to mourn former South Korean president Kim Dae-jung. Kim, a champion of inter-Korean co-operation and dialogue who served as president from 1998 to 2003, died on Tuesday aged 85.

The visit – the first by a North Korean delegation to mourn a South Korean leader – comes amid recent signs of a thaw in relations between the two sides, which have remained divided since the end of the Korean War in 1953.

Kim Yang Gon, the spy chief who also handles relations with South Korea, held an 80-minute meeting yesterday with South Korean unification minister Hyun In-taek. It was the first such top-level encounter in almost two years.

South Korea said the North Korean officials, who had planned to return home yesterday, requested a meeting with Lee. They were reported to be carrying a letter from North Korean leader Kim Jong Il.

Kim Yong-hyun, a professor at Seoul's Dongguk University, said Lee was probably reluctant to show eagerness to meet the North Koreans at it could invite a backlash from conservatives who oppose any softening toward Pyongyang.