Key aide of N. Korean leader to wraps up rare visit to Seoul

Posted on : 2007-12-01 12:10 KST Modified on : 2007-12-01 12:10 KST

A senior North Korean official in charge of inter-Korean relations and intelligence was to end his rare trip to South Korea later Saturday and return home via the heavily fortified border dividing the Koreas, Seoul officials said.

Before his departure, Kim Yang-gon, a close confidant of reclusive North Korean leader Kim Jong-il, will hold talks with a group of former and incumbent South Korean officials who in 2000 accompanied then South Korean President Kim Dae-jung on his trip to Pyongyang for talks with the North Korean leader, the officials said.

Kim, head of the United Front Department at the North's ruling Workers' Party, was earlier expected to hold talks with South Korean Unification Minister Lee Jae-joung and the chief of the country's National Intelligence Service, Kim Man-bok, on Saturday, but he cancelled the meetings, according to the officials. Kim held talks with the unification minister on Thursday when he began his rare three-day trip to Seoul.

He also held a meeting with South Korea's cultural and literary authorities, including Yoo Hong-joon, head of the Cultural Heritage Administration, earlier Saturday.

"Kim exchanged views with the participants on ways to expand cultural exchanges between the North and the South," an official from the South Korean Unification Ministry said, adding the North Korean also expressed willingness to implement the agreement to that end reached at the recent summit between South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun and the North Korean leader.

Kim is the second high-ranking North Korean official to visit Seoul since the second-ever inter-Korean summit, held in Pyongyang on Oct. 2-4. The North's Prime Minister Kim Yong-il visited Seoul on Nov. 14-16 for talks with his South Korean counterpart, the first prime ministerial talks between the two sides in 15 years.

SEOUL, Dec. 1 (Yonhap)