Koreas to hold ministerial talks Feb. 3-6
2004-01-27
Seoul will urge Pyongyang to rejoin six-party talks over its nuclear weapons program when South and North Korea next month hold their first ministerial talks of the year, the Unification Ministry announced on Monday (Jan. 26).
The meetings are scheduled for Feb. 3-6 at the Shilla Hotel in central Seoul. Seoul negotiators will also exhort their northern counterparts to reopen stalled talks between their defense ministers, whose first and only meeting was in September 2001.
Officials in Seoul and Washington have recently displayed optimism over the prospects for the resumption of nuclear talks next month.
Six-party talks adjourned in August with little progress toward a compromise in the standoff between the United States and North Korea over the north's nuclear program.
China, Japan and Russia as well as the two Koreas and the United States are involved.
The Koreas will also discuss specific measures to encourage bilateral economic cooperation projects under way in the North, such as construction of an industrial park in the North's city of Gaeseong and linking of cross-border railways and roads.
And they are expected to arrange a date for a ninth round of reunions for families separated by the 1950-53 Korean War. Officials from the South and the North agreed at the previous minister-level talks to open the ninth such meeting in commemoration of the Lunar New Year holidays.
Meanwhile, Unification Minister Jeong Se-hyun, chief representative to the 13th cabinet-level meeting between the two Koreas, on Monday began a series of simulation meetings with other negotiators.
Officials from the Unification Ministry and the presidential National Security Council will hold five or six simulation meetings to come up with negotiating strategies before the February talks begin, government officials said.
Source : www.korea.net
|
NEWSLETTER
|
| Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list |
|
|
|
