Asia-Pacific

S Korea: No quick response to DPRK's proposal to resume tours

(Xinhua)
Updated: 2010-01-15 10:39

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SEOUL: South Korea said Friday it does not plan to immediately respond to the Democratic People's Republic of Korea's proposal that came a day ago to resume the halted tours to the country, Seoul's Ministry of Unification said.

"The government is currently reviewing (the DPRK's proposal) and will announce its stance as soon as it's done with it," said unification ministry spokesman Chun Hae-sung.

"But there is no plan to announce the government's position today," he said.

The remarks came after the DPRK's proposed on Thursday working-level talks with South Korea to discuss resuming tours to its mountain resort on the east coast and the border village of Kaesong near the west coast.

The tour to Mount Kumgang was halted in 2008 soon after a South Korean female tourist was shot to death by a DPRK sentinel, and the tour to the border town was also suspended in the same year.

"There needs to be an investigation to get to the bottom of the incident (at the resort), and measures to prevent recurrences should be systematically drawn up. And all this needs to be based on discussions between South Korea and the DPRK," Chun said, reiterating South Korea's position.

But even if South Korea's requirements are accepted, it would not automatically lead to the resumption of the tours, he added.

The DPRK's proposal is the latest in the series of moves the country has recently made in a potential step toward dialogue, including its proposal to reach a peace treaty to replace a truce that ended the Korean War and left the two Koreas technically at war.