(2nd LD) N. Korea proposes talks with S. Korea on resuming joint tours

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By Sam Kim
SEOUL, Jan. 14 (Yonhap) -- North Korea on Thursday proposed talks with South
Korea on resuming joint tours to its scenic mountain and a historic border town
that had been suspended after inter-Korean ties unraveled in 2008.

The proposal to hold the talks Jan. 26-27 at Mount Kumgang came a day after the
North agreed to hold a meeting with the South next week on ways to improve their
joint industrial park in Kaesong.
The tour to Mount Kumgang on the east coast was suspended in July 2008 after a
South Korean tourist was shot dead by a North Korean soldier after wandering into
a restricted area near the resort. The tour to the North Korean border town of
Kaesong near the west coast was also suspended in November of the same year.
Both tours had been important sources of money for the cash-strapped communist
country, which was slapped with a fresh round of U.N. sanctions for its nuclear
test in May last year. It said in its New Year's Day message on Jan. 1 that its
intention to improve ties with South Korea remains "unshakable."
"It is very regrettable that tour of Mt. Kumgang and the area of Kaesong has been
suspended for one and a half years," North Korea said Thursday in its message to
South Korea, according to its official Korean Central News Agency.
South Korean Unification Ministry spokesman Chun Hae-sung confirmed the proposal
was made by the Korea Asia-Pacific Peace Committee, which oversees inter-Korean
businesses for North Korea. Another official, who declined to be named because
the proposal was under review, said his government was likely to accept it.
"It's a positive move, and we will consider it positively," the official said.
The proposal came after a Chinese operator of tours to North Korea reportedly
relayed a message from Pyongyang this week, saying it hopes to attract more
foreign tourists this year.
Under a slogan that calls for the achievement of a "strong and prosperous nation"
by 2012, North Korea said in its New Year's Day message that it will step up
efforts to create foreign revenue as part of its campaign to raise the standard
of living for its people.
Earlier Thursday, South Korea said officials from Seoul and Pyongyang will meet
on Tuesday to discuss results from their recent joint survey of overseas
industrial parks, as well as ways to improve their own factory town in Kaesong.
The meeting will be the first official contact this year between the countries,
which remain technically at war after the 1950-53 Korean War that ended in a
truce. The sides had sent a 10-member delegation each for a joint survey of
industrial parks in China and Vietnam from Dec. 12-22.
samkim@yna.co.kr
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