Two Koreas end high-level talks with no apparent agreement By AFP

PHOTO: tuoitrenews.vn

North and South Korea on Saturday wrapped up
two days of rare, high-level talks aimed at easing
cross-border tensions, with no agreement and no
set date for further discussions.
A media pool report from the meeting venue in
the jointly-run Kaesong industrial zone, on the
North Korean side of the border, said the talks
had ended without a joint statement and no
agreed schedule for another round.
An official from the South’s Unification Ministry
was to give a detailed briefing on the outcome of
the dialogue later.
The vice-minister-level talks, with a mandate to
address a broad but unspecified range of inter-
Korean issues, were the first of their type for
nearly two years.
While no substantial breakthrough had been
expected, there were hopes of some tangible
progress with both sides seeking the resumption
of stalled cooperation projects that have
significant symbolic and financial value.
The talks, held on the North Korean side of the
border in the jointly-run Kaesong industrial
zone, were a key element of an accord reached in
August to end a dangerous military standoff.
At the height of that crisis, fuelled by high-decibel
bellicose rhetoric, both Koreas went on a virtual
war footing after a brief artillery exchange across
their land border.
Although there had been no set agenda for the
Kaesong discussions, they were understood to
have focused on reviving two cross-border
programmes.
The cash-strapped North wanted 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.
Restarting the tours would be a useful
propaganda victory for Kim Jong-Un, as well as
providing a source of much-needed hard
revenue.
South Korea, meanwhile, wanted the North to
agree to regular reunions for families separated
by the Korean War.
Currently the reunions are being held less than
once a year and with only a very limited number
of participants — despite a huge waiting list of
largely elderly South Koreans desperate to see
their relatives in the North before they die.