Seoul, Pyongyang to hold working-level contact

The two Koreas on Friday agreed on a working-level contact next week to discuss the timing, venue and agenda for inter-governmental talks that the two sides had agreed in late August to hold.

Seoul's unification ministry said in a statement that it accepted Pyongyang's offer to hold working-level contact on November 26 at the Tongil House, an administrative building on the north side of the truce village of Panmunjom, Xinhua reported.

North Korea's Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of Korea sent the proposal notice earlier in the day to South Korea's Unification Ministry, which in turn sent a consent notice.

The ministry said that the two sides will discuss comprehensive working-level issues during the upcoming contact for an inter-governmental dialogue, upon which the two sides agreed in late August.

Top-level military advisors to South Korean President Park Geun-hye and top North Korea leader Kim Jong Un agreed on August 25 to hold an inter-governmental dialogue at an earliest possible date in Seoul or Pyongyang.

The August 25 agreement came as tensions soared on the Korean peninsula after landmine blasts in border areas, which maimed two South Korean soldiers, and a rare exchange of fire across the border.

On the dialogue table at the working-level contact would be the timing, venue, agenda and the rank of chief representatives from the two sides for the inter-governmental talks.

"If the contact is held, the biggest issue is expected to be who will be chief representatives from the two sides," said Cheong Seong-Chang, a senior analyst at the private Sejong Institute think tank.

In June 2013, the two sides had agreed to hold an inter-governmental dialogue, but it failed to be held at the time amid wrangling over "rank" of the chief representatives.

Cheong said that if another dispute happen over the rank, improved relations would be hard to see in the future.

The working-level contact came about three months after the August 25 agreement that defused military tensions on the peninsula that had pushed the two sides to the brink of an armed conflict.

Seoul had offered to Pyongyang on September 21, September 24 and October 30 each to hold the working-level contact, but North Korea had refused to accept the proposals, South Korea has claimed.

On Wednesday, Pyongyang denied Seoul's claim, urging South Korea to drop hostility against North Korea.

Pyongyang accused Seoul of impure intentions to shift responsibility of failure to launch the talks to North Korea.