By RIA Novosti
Tokyo : South Korea could deliver food aid worth $20 million to Pyongyang through the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the country's unification minister said Thursday.
"This is totally different in nature from the provision of rice to the North (Korea) in the form of a loan," the Yonhap news agency quoted Lee Jae-joung as saying.
The minister has consistently stressed that Seoul will not resume rice supplies to North Korea until Pyongyang meets the demands put forward at the February round of six-nation talks.
Seoul made it clear earlier that it would cooperate with North Korea, and plans to supply 400,000 tonnes of rice as part of a 30-year $150-million loan with an initial delivery of 50,000 tonnes of fuel oil.
North Korea has been facing serious food shortage, the FAO said.
Bilateral relations between the two Koreas were disrupted after Pyongyang conducted a nuclear test in October 2006.
Dialogue resumed when North Korea agreed to stop its nuclear reactor and give the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspectors access to the country's nuclear facility in a six-party agreement on February 13.