SEOUL – North and South Korean military officers will meet this week at a truce village on their heavily fortified border in a test of a pledge by the North to ease tension after a major security crisis last year. Regional powers have nudged the rivals to defuse the crisis and restart international talks over the North’s nuclear programme. The two Koreas are still technically at war because an armistice not a treaty ended the 1950-53 Korean War.
The meeting will be the first dialogue between them since last September, and the first since tension peaked on the peninsula late last year. Last March, South Korea accused the North of sinking one of its navy ships killing 46 sailors. Then in November, the North bombarded a South Korean island in disputed waters off the west coast, leading to an angry exchange of threats and a risk of major conflict that rattled financial markets.
The two sides agreed last week to hold a preliminary round of military talks on Feb 8 to set the time and agenda for higher-level talks, possibly between their defence ministers. South Korea said a formal apology for what it saw as the blatant North Korean provocations last year was not needed for it to consider going ahead with the higher-level talks.
“You don’t have colonels talking about apologising,” a South Korean official said, referring to the officers who will meet on Tuesday. North Korea threatened nuclear war on the peninsula at the height of tension but in a sharp change of tack, it has repeatedly called for dialogue with the South since January.
