Top aides to the leaders of North and South Korea continued their talks after nearly three hours on Saturday, the South's Unification Ministry said, held to address tensions following an exchange of artillery fire that threatened military conflict.
The talks were announced just hours before the deadline of an ultimatum set by the North to begin military action unless the South halted propaganda broadcasts at the border that had prompted Pyongyang to fire artillery against the South.
Tension on the Korean peninsula has been running high since an exchange of artillery fire on Thursday, prompting calls for calm from the United Nations, the United States and the North's lone major ally, China. South Korea's military remained on high alert despite the announced talks, a defence ministry official said.
"The South and the North agreed to hold contact related to the ongoing situation in South-North relations," Kim Kyou-hyun, the presidential Blue House's deputy national security adviser, said in a televised briefing. Pyongyang made an initial proposal on Friday for a meeting, and Seoul made a revised proposal on Saturday seeking Hwang's attendance, Kim said.
"They need to come up with some sort of an agreement where both sides have saved face. That would be the trick," said James Kim, a research fellow at the Asan Institute for Policy Studies in Seoul.
"North Korea will probably demand that the broadcasts be cut, and they may even come to an impasse on that issue." North Korea, technically still at war with the South after their 1950-53 conflict ended in a truce, not a peace treaty, had declared a "quasi-state of war" in front-line areas and set the deadline for Seoul to halt the broadcasts from loudspeakers placed along the border.
The talks were announced just hours before the deadline of an ultimatum set by the North to begin military action unless the South halted propaganda broadcasts at the border that had prompted Pyongyang to fire artillery against the South.
Tension on the Korean peninsula has been running high since an exchange of artillery fire on Thursday, prompting calls for calm from the United Nations, the United States and the North's lone major ally, China. South Korea's military remained on high alert despite the announced talks, a defence ministry official said.
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South Korean President Park Geun-hye's national security adviser and her unification minister were to meet Hwang Pyong So, the top military aide to North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, and a senior official who handles inter-Korean affairs at 6 pm Seoul time (0900 GMT).
"The South and the North agreed to hold contact related to the ongoing situation in South-North relations," Kim Kyou-hyun, the presidential Blue House's deputy national security adviser, said in a televised briefing. Pyongyang made an initial proposal on Friday for a meeting, and Seoul made a revised proposal on Saturday seeking Hwang's attendance, Kim said.
"They need to come up with some sort of an agreement where both sides have saved face. That would be the trick," said James Kim, a research fellow at the Asan Institute for Policy Studies in Seoul.
"North Korea will probably demand that the broadcasts be cut, and they may even come to an impasse on that issue." North Korea, technically still at war with the South after their 1950-53 conflict ended in a truce, not a peace treaty, had declared a "quasi-state of war" in front-line areas and set the deadline for Seoul to halt the broadcasts from loudspeakers placed along the border.