N. Korean delegation due in Seoul to mourn late Kim Dae-jung

(ATTN: UPDATES with ministry briefing, possibility for official meeting, quotes)
By Kim Hyun
SEOUL, Aug. 21 (Yonhap) -- A North Korean delegation was due in Seoul later
Friday to mourn late President Kim Dae-jung, a two-day visit that offers a rare
chance for high-level inter-Korean dialogue after months of tension.
In another conciliatory gesture, Pyongyang said it was normalizing traffic for
South Korean workers and cargo trains at the heavily fortified border and
temporarily reconnecting an inter-Korean communications channel that it severed
in November.
The six-member group, led by a top party secretary, was set to arrive at Seoul's
Gimpo Airport later in the afternoon to pay tribute to the late president. The
visit is the first by North Korean officials during the 18 months of Seoul's
conservative Lee Myung-bak government.
Seoul approved the trip "in honor of the bereaved family's opinion and in
consideration of inter-Korean relations," Unification Ministry spokesman Chun
Hae-sung said in a briefing.
Kim Dae-jung, who died from complications of pneumonia on Tuesday, held the
historic first inter-Korean summit with the North Korean leader in 2000. His
sunshine policy facilitated broad inter-Korean social exchanges and massive aid
to develop the North's dilapidated economy, moves that were rolled back by Lee.
The makeup of the top-notch delegation and the decision to stay overnight in
Seoul raised speculation that a high-level inter-Korean dialogue, possibly with
President Lee Myung-bak or Unification Minister Hyun In-taek, may be held during
the visit. The group includes Kim Ki-nam, a Workers' Party Central Committee
secretary most frequently included in the North Korean leader's entourage in
public activities, and Kim Yang-gon, head of the party's unification front
department and long-time architect of inter-Korean relations. North Korean media
called them "special envoys" authorized by Kim Jong-il.
Seoul officials said no meetings with Lee were scheduled but left the possibility
open.
"We are going to decide according to the situation after they have arrived," said
a high-level official, requesting anonymity.
The group will head directly from the airport to the National Assembly in central
Seoul where a memorial altar is set up for Sunday's state funeral service.
Other specifics of their itinerary, including where they will stay and whom they
are scheduled to meet until departure Saturday afternoon, were not disclosed as
Seoul has imposed strict restrictions on media access for "security reasons."
North Korea, meanwhile, has lifted all cross-border traffic bans imposed in
December to protest Seoul's hard-line policy. The North also reconnected a direct
communications channel operated by the Red Cross at the truce village of
Panmunjom Friday morning.
Such restrictions have strained business activity at a joint industrial park in
the North's border town of Kaesong, where more than 100 South Korean firms
operate with about 40,000 North Korean workers.
Conservative South Korean activists have planned protests to oppose the North
Koreans' trip and demand an apology for North Korea's detention of South Koreans.
Four South Korean fishermen have been detained since late July after their boat
strayed into North Korean waters.
"I will follow them along their itinerary," said Choi Sung-yong, who maintains
that his father, also a fisherman, was abducted by the North in the 1970s.
Pyongyang's fence-mending gestures follow dramatic trips to North Korea by former
U.S. President Bill Clinton and South Korea's Hyundai Group Chairwoman Hyun
Jeong-eun earlier this month, each of whom had hours of talks with the reclusive
North Korean leader.
In the meeting with the Hyundai chief, Kim agreed to "energize" inter-Korean
projects and reopen the border for joint tourism ventures and separated family
reunions, which were suspended as political relations chilled last year.
Meanwhile, South Korea proposed inter-Korean talks to set up family reunions on
the traditional Korean holiday of Chuseok in early October. The reunions have
been suspended for nearly two years.
hkim@yna.co.kr
(END)