Talks held to defuse Korean tensions

High-level military officials from North Korea and the US-led UN Command held urgent talks at the border today amid heightened tensions in the region and concerns that the North intends to test-fire a long-range missile.

The talks at the village of Panmunjom inside the Demilitarised Zone dividing North and South Korea – the first meetings between general-level military officials since 2002 – were hastily arranged after the North proposed them last week, UN command spokesman Kim Yong-kyu said.

“These talks can be useful in building trust and preventing misunderstanding as well as introducing transparency regarding the intentions of both sides,” the UN command said in a statement.

Mr Kim said his office would disclose details about the meeting after it was over.

Relations between the two Koreas are at their lowest point in a decade, with North Korea bristling over South Korean President Lee Myung-bak’s hard-line policy toward Pyongyang.

The two Koreas technically remain at war because their three-year conflict in the 1950s ended in a truce, not a peace treaty.

The tensions have intensified in recent weeks amid reports that North Korea is preparing to test a long-range missile believed capable of reaching US territory.

Analysts say communist North Korea also wants to capture President Barack Obama’s attention at a time when international disarmament talks with the regime remain stalled.

Mr Obama is dispatching his envoy for North Korea, Stephen W. Bosworth, to Asia this week to discuss the nuclear dispute.

Mr Bosworth plans to meet with officials in China, Japan and South Korea, and will consult separately with Russian officials, the US State Department said.