North, South Korea restart talks meant to ease animosity

The tour, launched in 1998, was suspended in July 2008 when a South Korean female tourist was shot dead by a North Korean soldier after venturing into an off-limit area.

South Korea, meanwhile, wants the North to agree to regular reunions for families separated by the Korean War.

The vice-minister-level negotiations were held Friday on the North Korean side of the border in the jointly-run Kaesong industrial zone, which opened in 2004 and has survived as a rare symbol of inter-Korean cooperation.

Yang Moo-Jin, professor at Seoul’s University of North Korean Studies, said the South’s refusal to discuss resumption of the tour programme – which was widely believed before the meeting to have been on the agenda – appeared to have left Pyongyang “deeply mistrustful” of Seoul. Greater than 19,700 Koreans have met at the temporary family reunions which were held irregularly between the rivals since 2000, together with almost 1,000 at the newest conferences at Diamond Mountain in October.

Analysts said restarting the tour programmes would have been a useful propaganda victory for him as well as providing a source of much-needed hard currency.

Any negotiations between the rivals, separated by the world’s most heavily armed border, should improve on the situation in August when they threatened each other with war over landmine explosions that maimed two South Korean soldiers.

Hwang Boogi, left, South Korea’s vice minister of unification and the head negotiator for high-level talks with North Korea, shakes hands with his North Korean counterpart Jon Jong Su, right, before their meeting at the Kaesong Industrial Complex in Kaesong, North Korea, Friday, Dec. 11, 2015. Pyongyang denies any involvement. “I hope various pending issues will be solved one by one”, Boo-gi said.

Several subsequent rounds of sabre rattling by North Korea towards South Korea and the United States have also tested China’s patience. The North says the maneuvers are rehearsals for war.

Unfortunately, the two Koreas could not decide upon the timing of their next meeting. An accompanying North Korean musical troupe, the State Merited Chorus, also pulled put because of the communication issues, Xinhua said. Members of the DPRK pop sensation Moranbong Band have been seen flying out of the Beijing Capital International Airport with few personal artifacts and dressed in military uniform around 1pm on Saturday afternoon, under the watchful eye of heavy security, after the abrupt cancellation of their performances.