[Yonhap Photo]
SEOUL -- South Korea's foreign minister urged North Korea Monday to open sincere talks with the United States on denuclearization as a South Korean presidential envoy embarked on a cross-border trip aimed at checking the veracity of a sudden peace overture extended by the North's reclusive leader.
Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-wha said Seoul and Washington would not ease diplomatic pressure and sanctions without Pyongyang's practical measures to denuclearize. "We urge North Korea not to miss this opportunity, but to engage in honest dialogue," she told a forum in Seoul.
North Korea can secure its "core" interests only through direct negotiations with the United States, Kang said, adding an inter-Korean thaw brought by the North's participation in the Winter Games in South Korea depends on how to achieve denuclearization.
Through Monday's trip by a South Korean delegation to Pyongyang, Seoul wants to check whether North Korea's peace offensive is genuine, the minister said. Her comment came shortly before a special plane carrying South Korean officials flew into Pyongyang.
The delegation included Chung Eui-yong, who heads the presidential National Security Office, National Intelligence Service (NIS) chief Suh Hoon and Vice Unification Minister Chun Hae-sung. Two others are Yun Kun-young, a presidential official, and Kim Sang-gyun, a senior NIS official.
During their stay in Pyongyang, the delegation is expected to deliver Moon's letter probably to North Korean leader Kim Jong-un who invited Moon through his sister, Yo-jong, to a summit in Pyongyang. The South Korean delegates will visit the United States later to explain the outcome of their trip.
If the North's leader allows direct talks with South Korean officials, that would be the first of its kind since he took office following the sudden death of his father, Kim Jong-il, in December 2011.
reporter
Lim Chang-won
cwlim34@ajunews.com
