Two Koreas hold rare talks

His North Korean counterpart is Hwang Chol, a director of the secretariat at the Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of Korea in charge of inter-Korean affairs. Conn-young. The plenary session of the talks began at 12:50 this afternoon and lasted for 90 minutes, with the two sides exchanging their proposals for the high-level talks, each represented by three officials.

Meanwhile, South Korea’s Northwest Islands Defense Command conducted a live-fire artillery drill as scheduled near the inter-Korean border in the Yellow Sea on Monday afternoon.

Seoul is expected to push for an expansion of reunions of families separated by the Korean War six decades ago.

The Thursday meeting was a fresh attempt by the two neighbors to resume dialog five years after they severed relations.

North Korea also said Seoul’s opposition to Pyongyang’s nuclear weapons program was “anti-North Korea” while the South engages in everyday exercises with “foreign forces” on an invasion of the North.

The August 25 deal defused the situation, although North Korea declined to respond to the South’s repeated requests for the planned talks to start.

According to Seoul’s Unification Ministry, there are now 172 “non-protected” North Korean defectors, and unlike peers, are ineligible for benefits such as resettlement money, housing subsidies and vocational training.

Sources in Pyongyang claim a decree has been issued banning men from having hair more than 2cm long and they are being instructed to pay tribute to the leader by adopting his odd hairdo.

 Seoul hopes future talks would be led by respective reunification ministers, while Pyongyang prefers to send its vice-ministerial equivalent.

The two Koreas are holding working-level talks at the inter-Korean border on this Thursday.

N orth and South Korean officials are meeting for talks about how to hold higher-level talks that would be the first between the two countries since 2007.

South Korea has been seeking the ability to enrich uranium to produce nuclear fuel, which it says will help reduce import costs and support its reactor exports.