North Korea proposes talks with South

A meeting between mid-tier officials from each side will be held at their border next Thursday, South Korea’sUnification Ministry said in a statement.

North Korea’s Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of Korea sent the proposal notice earlier in the day to South Korea’s Unification Ministry, which in turn sent a consent notice.

“It’s likely North Korea will capitalize on a visit from Ban to underscore Kim’s position as an worldwide leader”, said Yang Moo-jin, a professor at the University of North Korean Studies.

South Korea on Friday accepted the working-level contact proposal of North Korea.

Friday’s development comes amid efforts to arrange a visit to Pyongyang by United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon.

It has also come under increasing pressure on the human rights front, following a report published previous year by a United Nations commission that concluded North Korea was committing human rights violations “without parallel in the contemporary world”.

Two of the five permanent members of the Security Council, Russian Federation and China, however, are traditional partners of Pyongyang, and have treaded carefully on the issue of North Korea human rights.

Relations between the two countries reached a post-war nadir following the sinking in 2010 of a South Korean warship, another incident Seoul blames on Pyongyang.

Seoul has blamed Pyongyang for not responding to its repeated calls for inter-governmental talks. Two South Korean soldiers were injured in the incident, for which North Korea has denied responsibility.

“At the working-level talks, the two sides will discuss details about the higher-level talks: who will attend the talks, when they will be held and what kind of issues will be included in the agenda”, the official added on customary condition of anonymity.

South Korea seeks to hold family reunions on a regular basis, calling on the North to allow such families to exchange letters.