North Korea wants to talk

The North’s government proposed the meeting with the South to be held on November 26 at the truce village on their heavily militarised border.

North and South Korea agreed on Friday to hold border talks next week, following up on an earlier agreement for such dialogue to discuss easing tensions and improving ties on the divided Korean Peninsula.

The United Nations spokesman’s office in NY and Seoul’s Unification Ministry declined to comment on the possible trip, which would be Ban’s first visit to the closed country in his capacity as United Nations chief.

Analysts in Seoul said at the time that Pyongyang may have scrapped the trip because it felt Ban would back only the views of Washington and Seoul.

In recent weeks, South Korea has repeatedly proposed starting the government talks, but the North had not responded until Friday.

Resuming high-level talks was among a set of agreements the sides struck after they averted the bloodshed they had threatened each other over land mine blasts blamed on Pyongyang that maimed two South Korean soldiers.

“Sometimes these talks break down before they even start over what level to send, so this sounds like a very pragmatic and straightforward approach”, he added. Millions of family members were separated after the 1950-1953 Korean War, which ended in an armistice not a peace treaty.

Relations between the neighbors have been all but frozen since the 2010 sinking of a South Korean warship, which killed 46 sailors, in an incident Seoul blames on the North. Pyongyang denies any role.

North Korea executed three women for allegedly recording a South Korean television miniseries.