ID :
354646
Tue, 01/20/2015 - 09:33
Auther :

S Korea plans offering N Korea trial run of trains by two countries’ railways

SEOUL, January 20. /TASS/. Government of the Republic of Korea plans offering the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea to hold a trial run of trains by the railway lines linking the southern cities of Busan and Mokpo with the cities in the North of the Korean Peninsula and farther on to the Russian Trans-Siberian Railroad and the mainlines on the territory of China, a South Korean daily said on Tuesday. The action should be timed for what the daily Dong-a Ilbo terms as the 70th anniversary since partitioning of Korean Peninsula, or the liberation of Korea in 1945 from Japanese occupation by the Soviet Army and the U.S. Armed Forces. In line with the plan, one train will traverse a line from Busan to Seoul to Pyongyang to Sinuiju to China, while another train will cross to two Koreas from Mokpo to Seoul to Rajin to the Trans-Siberian Railroad. If the North Korean leadership agrees with the proposal, cultural events in Seoul and Pyongyang may be organized on the occasion, the report said. The Ministry for Reunification hopes to hold the trial runs sometime around August 15 when both Koreas mark the anniversary since the historical homeland’s liberation from the Japanese colonial rule /1910 to 1945/. It also plans to set up a bilateral organization in Seoul and Pyongyang for supporting inter-Korean exchanges. This option will help evade the sanctions against North Korea that Seoul introduced on May 24, 2010, which have turned into an impediment for the intensification of exchanges and promotion of bilateral cooperation projects. The Administration of South Korean President Park Geun-hye believes that resolution of the problems like the lifting of sanctions and resumption of the tourist project in the area of North Korea’s Kumgangsan Mountain will be possible only in the process of negotiations. Pyongyang has so far given no answer to the proposals to hold high-level inter-Korean consultations, which Seoul has come up with on a number of occasions in the past. Read more

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