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Senior government officials and politicians have been talking up the possibility of a second inter-Korean summit and are concentrating their energies on bringing it about. The new Unification Minister Lee Jae-joung said Monday an inter-Korean summit was a long-pending issue. South and North Korean leaders agreed to hold one in 2000, and President Roh Moo-hyun has stressed the need for a second summit several times, he said. Speaking after his inauguration, the minister told reporters arranging the summit was a task for the leaders of both Koreas. But he added it remains to be seen when and how another inter-Korean summit will take place.
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New Unification Minister Lee Jae-joung speaks at his inauguration at the Government Complex on Monday.
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As vice chairman of the Advisory Council on Democratic Peaceful Unification, it was Lee who advised Roh to make talks between top brass from the two Korean militaries a regular fixture.
From the ruling Uri Party, chairman Kim Geun-tae and former chairman Chung Dong-young both stressed the need for an inter-Korean summit. The outgoing unification minister Lee Jong-seok recently said in a private gathering that an inter-Korean summit should be promoted if at all possible.
Grand National Party lawmaker Jung Hyung-geun said Monday government and intelligence officials told him that working-level officials from the two Koreas are in the ¡°last stages¡± of negotiations for the agenda, date and venue of an inter-Korean summit. He said if South Korea pushes for a summit, North Korea would accept the offer since it can expect many benefits. Earlier, the opposition lawmaker told KBS Radio he expected an inter-Korean summit in March or April next year. He said a summit could ¡°trigger a rearrangement of the political landscape,¡± that could influence next year¡¯s presidential election.
But a government official denied the government is working toward an inter-Korean summit, quoting Roh as saying that a summit ¡°cannot be held unilaterally¡± and that the North is not a place that one can visit at will. The president made the remarks during a visit to New Zealand on Dec. 8.
(englishnews@chosun.com )
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