South Korea's defense minister will visit North Korea next month as part of a rare summit with the communist nation, the first time a defense chief from the South will journey to the North, an official said yesterday.
Unification Minister Lee Jae-joung said Defense Minister Kim Jang-soo will accompany President Roh Moo-hyun when he visits Pyongyang from Oct. 2 to Oct. 4. He made the announcement at a briefing in Seoul.
Kim will be the first South Korean defense minister to visit the North since the two Koreas were divided more than a half century ago. The Korean War ended in a truce, not a peace treaty, which means the two sides still remain technically at war.
He will be among a 13-member official entourage that also includes the ministers for finance and economy, agriculture and forestry, health and welfare, the chief presidential security adviser and the country's spy agency chief, Lee said.
The two Koreas held their first-ever summit in 2000 in Pyongyang between then South Korean president Kim Dae-jung and the North's Kim Jong-il. At the time, the South's defense chief did not travel along with the president.
The North's defense minister came to the South later that year for the first and only meeting with his South Korean counterpart.
Kim's inclusion raised speculation that the two sides may discuss the North's demand that their disputed western sea border be redrawn. Lee could not say whether the issue would be taken up at the summit.
North Korea does not recognize the current border which was drawn unilaterally by the UN at the end of the 1950 to 1953 Korean War.
Pyongyang has long demanded that the South agree to talk about moving the border further south.
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