SEOUL – South and North Korea held more talks Tuesday about a potential volcanic threat from the peninsula’s highest mountain, in a rare example of cooperation after months of confrontation. Four South Korean experts met their North Korean counterparts at the North’s border town of Kaesong for a second round of talks on ways to deal with any eruption at Mount Paektu, the South’s unification ministry said.
After a day of discussions they agreed to hold an experts’ meeting next month in the North’s capital Pyongyang or another location, the ministry said. They also agreed to conduct a joint field inspection of the mountain, on the border between North Korea and China, in mid-June. At the first meeting on March 29 at the South Korean border city of Munsan, the delegations agreed on the need for joint research into potential hazards and the North offered the South’s experts access to the peak.
