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North, South Koreas hold military talks on border

Posted on: Tuesday, 19 July 2005, 23:44 CDT

SEOUL (Reuters) - Senior military officers from South and North Korea began rare talks on Wednesday aimed at building trust between two armies that have faced off for decades along the one of the world's most fortified borders.

The meeting of colonels at the Panmunjum truce village inside the Demilitarised Zone sets the stage for a meeting of military generals, which is likely to be held next month in North Korea, South Korean officials have said.

The talks reopen a channel of dialogue between two militaries that are technically still at war and come days before six-party talks in Beijing on ending North Korea's nuclear arms program. The 1950-53 Korean War ended in a truce, not a full peace treaty.

Two rounds of talks by military generals last year resulted in an agreement, not yet fully implemented, to cease propaganda broadcasts along the Cold War's last frontier and establish radio hotlines between the two Koreas' navies.

"This is about reducing tension on the Korean peninsula," said South Korea's top delegate to the talks, Army Colonel Moon Sung-muk.

Moon said the two sides will also discuss ways to better improve communication between the two Koreas' navies operating in disputed waters off the peninsula.

Naval clashes in rich fishing grounds of the Yellow Sea in past years left scores of sailors on both sides dead or wounded. South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun has said the potential for such clashes remains the biggest threat to stability on the Korean peninsula.

Despite stepped-up bilateral ties in recent weeks and an unprecedented -- and unrepeated -- meeting of the two Koreas' leaders in June 2000, military tensions have remained high.

The majority of the North's 1.2 million soldiers are deployed near the border against the South's 690,000 troops. The United States reinforces the South with about 32,000 troops.

The military contacts, last held in June 2004, were suspended after Seoul accused Northern ships of violating the sea border.

Source: REUTERS

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