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Six-nation working-group talks on energy aid to North Korea slated for next month will likely be held at Panmunjom, a village on the inter-Korean border where U.N. command and North Korean officials occasionally meet to oversee the armistice that ended the 1950-53 Korean War, South Korean officials said Sunday.

South Korea had proposed holding the meeting at either the southern section of Panmunjom or the South Korean port city of Busan on Aug. 8-9, and the North accepted the border village as the venue, said the officials.

One or two member countries in the six-party talks have yet to agree to the proposed meeting but it's likely the meeting will be held at Panmunjom on those dates, they said. The participants in the negotiations are the two Koreas, the United States, China, Russia and Japan.

The six nations agreed to hold a series of working-group talks to implement a Feb. 13 agreement, which calls for the North to dismantle its nuclear weapons program in return for energy aid and other benefits. South Korea is to host working-group talks on the energy aid.

The energy talks are expected to be the first international talks on North Korea to be held in South Korea since the ongoing North Korean nuclear standoff erupted in the fall of 2002. China, the North's last major ally and aid provider, has so far hosted every round of the six-party nuclear talks.

Also, holding the talks in Panmunjom will help the international community better understand the Korean Peninsula, the world's last remaining Cold War flash point, as it symbolizes the peninsula's division and military confrontation, Korea watchers said.

The Koreas are still technically in a state of war, as the armistice, signed by the U.N. command, North Korea and China, has never been converted into a peace treaty. The inter-Korean border is sealed and guarded by hundreds of thousands of combat troops on each side.

Panmunjom is located about 60 kilometers north of Seoul and about 170 kilometers south of Pyongyang, the capital of North Korea.
SEOUL, July 29 (Yonhap News)