by admin | May 25, 2021 | World
South Korean President Moon Jae-in (R) and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un (L) (file photo)
Seoul : South Korea on Thursday urged North Korea to fulfil the agreements reached during the inter-Korean summit and to resume talks a day after Pyongyang cancelled a high-level meeting with Seoul and said it was reconsidering its participation in the upcoming summit with the US.
The message was issued by the standing committee of South Korea’s National Security Council (NSC) after North Korea cancelled Wednesday’s talks for implementing the Panmunjom Declaration signed on April 27 between its leader Kim Jong-un and South Korean President Moon Jae-in, Efe news reported.
“While reaffirming their stance that the declaration… must be carried out without any disruption, the members agreed to continue consulting with the North side to hold the high-level talks at an early date,” the committee said in a statement.
In the declaration, the two Koreas had agreed to work for establishing peace and denuclearizing the Korean peninsula.
The council, headed by top security advisor Chung Eui-yong, also backed the summit between Kim and the US President Donald Trump, on June 12 in Singapore, although Pyongyang’s statements on Wednesday raised doubts about its future.
The NSC said it would boost cooperation between Seoul, Washington and Pyongyang to make the summit a success “under the spirit of mutual respect”.
North Korea had announced that it was reconsidering its participation in the summit, alleging that the US wanted to pressurize it to accept a complete unilateral nuclear disarmament, a condition which it termed unacceptable.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Business Summit, Events, Social Round-up, World
Kim Jong-un
Seoul : North Korean leader Kim Jong-un will cross the border on foot to attend the historic inter-Korean summit on Friday, the Presidential office said here on Thursday.
Kim will meet South Korean President Moon Jae-in on the military demarcation line (MDL) dividing the two Koreas at 9.30 a.m., Xinhua quoted the Blue House as saying.
Kim will cross the MDL, marked only by a low concrete slab, through a narrow aisle between the blue pavilions sitting in the middle of Panmunjom, a border village straddling the two Koreas.
Later both leaders would be escorted by honour guards towards Peace House, the summit venue on the southern side.
Kim will become the first North Korean leader to step on South Korean soil since the end of the 1950-53 Korean War, which ended with an armistice instead of a peace treaty, Efe news reported.
The government in Seoul reported that after a welcoming ceremony and a brief informal talk, the first round of the summit will begin at 10.30 a.m.
Among the nine delegates designated by Pyongyang are the country’s honorary president Kim Yong-nam, Foreign Minister Ri Yong-ho and Kim’s sister Kim Yo-jong, who is director of the Propaganda and Agitation Department of the Workers’ Party of North Korea.
Kim Yo-jong had made a historic visit to the South in February during the Winter Games to facilitate the rapprochement.
After the morning session the two parties will have lunch separately before they plant a tree together in a symbolic ceremony.
The two leaders will then go for a short, informal walk before resuming talks.
At the end of the meeting, Moon and Kim Jong-un will sign an agreement and make an announcement, according to a Seoul spokesperson.
He added that where and how the announcement will be made will be determined by the content of the agreement.
The banquet, in which Seoul hopes that Kim’s wife Ri Sol-ju can attend, will start at 6.30 p.m., followed by a “farewell ceremony” that will conclude the summit, according to the details provided by Moon’s office.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Business Summit, Events, Social Round-up, World
Seoul : North Korea requested a one-day postponement to the working-level meeting with South Korea, initially planned to be held on Wednesday to discuss details of an inter-Korean leader summit in late April, South Korea’s Unification Ministry said.
The meeting has been postponed to Thursday by North Korea, which did not specify the reasons behind the delay, a spokesperson for the South Korean Unification Ministry told Efe news.
Delegations from Pyongyang and Seoul were scheduled to hold a working-level meeting on Wednesday at the militarised border to specify details on the protocol and security of the summit.
North Korea also proposed that the two Koreas hold another talk on Saturday to discuss ways to establish a direct hotline between their leaders, Kim Jong-un and President Moon Jae-in, with the aim of facilitating preparations for the summit, according to the Ministry.
Seoul and Pyongyang have not yet publicly detailed the contents of the summit’s agenda, which will be the first encounter between the leaders of North Korea and South Korea in 11 years, and also mark the first time ever that a North Korean leader sets foot on South Korean soil, as the summit is planned to be held on the southern side of the border.
South Korea will send a seven-member delegation, led by the presidential secretary on protocol, Cho Han-ki, to the upcoming working-level meeting, while the North has yet to confirm its plan to send a six-member delegation to the talks.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Events, Social Round-up, World
Seoul : The North Korean leader and South Korean high-level envoys have reached an “satisfactory” agreement during their meeting in Pyongyang, to hold a inter-Korean summit with the South Korean President, the North Korean state news agency KCNA reported on Tuesday.
Seoul’s representatives delivered a letter from South Korean President Moon Jae-in to Kim Jong-un, who, upon “hearing the intention of President Moon Jae-in for a summit (…), exchanged views and made a satisfactory agreement,” according to the North Korean state media.
Kim and the South Korean envoys also exchanged views on what steps to take to “ease the military tensions on the Korean Peninsula and promote dialogue, cooperation and exchange.”
The North Korean leader, according to Efe, held a “sincere conversation” with Seoul’s delegation, showed them his “firm will to vigorously advance the north-south relations and write a new history of national reunification” and gave instructions to “rapidly take practical steps” for this bilateral improvement.
In early February, Kim Yo-jong, the sister of the North Korean leader, made an historic visit to South Korea on the occasion of the Winter Olympic Games, held in the South Korean county of PyeongChang, and conveyed to Moon an invitation to travel to Pyongyang and participate in a high-level inter-Korean summit, the first of its kind in more than a decade.
The South Korean president welcomed the invitation, but considered that certain conditions should be met to make his visit to Pyongyang a reality, including a new round of talks between the United States and North Korea.
If the meeting between Kim and Moon were to be held, it would be the first inter-Korean summit in more than a decade, after the ones held in Pyongyang in 2000 and 2007 between the late leader and father of Kim Jong-un, Kim Jong-il, and the former South Korean presidents Kim Dae-jung and Roh Tae-woo, respectively.
—IANS
