By DPA
Seoul : The second-ever summit meeting later this month between leaders of South and North Korea will bring about a normalization of relations, said South Korea’s President Roh Moo Hyun Wednesday after the two sides decided to meet.
President Roh will travel to Pyongyang from Aug 28-30 for the first inter-Korean summit since June 2000 with North Korean leader Kim Jong Il, it was announced Wednesday.
The preparations for the meeting should focus on “making practical progress in Korean Peninsula denuclearisation, inter-Korean peace, arms control and economic cooperation”, said Roh, whose office announced that the agenda and other details would be negotiated in working-level meetings next week in the border city of Kaesong.
“The second inter-Korean summit will help normalize relations and provide fresh momentum to improve North Korea’s relations with international society.”
Talks are expected to revolve around achieving peace on the Korean peninsula and ending North Korea’s nuclear programme.
North Korea confirmed the meeting between Kim and Roh, saying the meeting is of great importance because it opens a “new phase of peace on the Korean Peninsula, co-prosperity of the nation and national reunification”, according to the government’s Korean Central News Agency.
The historical summit held seven years ago between then South Korean president Kim Dae Jung and North Korean leader Kim, also in Pyongyang, led to rapprochement and reconciliation. Kim Dae Jung received the Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts to engage the communist North through the so-called “sunshine policy”.
South Korea’s main opposition Grand National Party (GNP) has criticized the meeting, calling it a political move to influence December’s presidential election, according to Yonhap news agency. Two GNP candidates lead in the polls.
The government claims North Korea agreed to the meeting as a result of the progress made in the six-nation nuclear talks.
Delegates from the US, Russia, China, Japan and the two Koreas met in Seoul Tuesday to discuss the logistics of shipping energy aid to North Korea as part of a February deal to shut down the communist nation’s nuclear reactors. South Korea began the first energy shipments last month.
China’s foreign ministry said it hopes the second summit between the two Koreas would lead to “positive results”.
North and South Korea are still technically in a state of war because the 1950-53 Korean War ended in a truce, not a peace treaty.