hankyoreh

Members of South Korea's progressive Democratic Labor Party (DLP) arrived in Pyongyang on Tuesday for talks expected to cover the rising tension over North Korea's nuclear weapons program.

In a dispatch from the North Korean capital, the North's Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) confirmed the arrival of the South Korean delegates, saying a delegation of the South Korean party "arrived here Tuesday."

The KCNA report said the South Koreans were "met at the airport by Kim Yong-dae, chairman of the Central Committee of the Korean Social Democratic Party, and officials concerned."

During the five-day trip, the 13-member delegation is to meet North Korea's No. 2 leader Kim Yong-nam, as well as other ranking officials of the North Korean party, DLP officials in Seoul said.

The party may also meet North Korea's reclusive leader Kim Jong-il, as it had requested the meeting, they said.

"We came a long way round via China to meet our families on the other side of the nation, which has been divided due to external circumstances, but we are overwhelmed with joy and pounding hearts as we arrive in Pyongyang," Moon Sung-hyun, the party chairman, said in an arrival speech at Pyongyang's Sunan Airport, according to the party officials.

The delegation arrived in Pyongyang aboard a North Korean Air Koryo flight from China, as there are no direct flights between the Koreas.

"While staying in Pyongyang, we'll discuss friendship-building and exchange programs between the Democratic Labor Party and the Social Democratic Party, peace on the Korean Peninsula and the realization of the June 15 agreement," he said.

The June 15 agreement refers to rapprochement accords agreed upon after the leaders of the two Koreas held the first-ever inter-Korean summit talks in Pyongyang on June 15, 2000.

The visit came at a sensitive time, when a DLP secretary-general and former party member were arrested on charges of spying for North Korea and violating the National Security Law.

Both the DLP and North Korea denied the allegations, and the North called the arrest a plot by pro-U.S. forces in South Korea to fan up anti-North Korea sentiment and justify sanctions on the North.

North Korea was slapped with United Nations arms and financial sanctions for its Oct. 9 nuclear weapon test, which sparked concerns of a regional arms race and armed conflict between the North and the United States.


Seoul, Oct. 31 (Yonhap News)