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Seoul 'resolute' on N. Korea: official
SEOUL, Sept. 4 (Yonhap) -- The government will maintain its "resolute" stance toward North Korea despite signs the communist country may have adopted a more conciliatory policy, a senior policymaker said Friday.
Speaking in a workshop on North Korean defectors who have settled in the South, Vice Unification Minister Hong Yang-ho said Seoul's aim is to get Pyongyang to come to talks designed to end the nuclear standoff and ease tension.
North Korea earlier this year tested its second nuclear device and launched a long-range rocket, triggering international sanctions and further exacerbating inter-Korean relations that have been souring since early 2008.
However, the North softened its rhetoric in recent months by offering to talk directly with the United States. It also released two American female reporters and agreed to lift restrictions it unilaterally imposed late last year that have hurt businesses operating in the Kaesong industrial complex. In addition, it sent a delegation to the funeral of former President Kim Dae-jung last month, with the chief delegate meeting President Lee Myung-bak.
"There have been conciliatory gestures by the North that can be viewed as a good sign, but since the country has declined to come back to the six-party talks or give up its nuclear weapons, we cannot see the changes as being fundamental," he said.
Hong stressed that such a move could be a "tactical shift" and not a change in overall strategy.
"Under such circumstances, Seoul will not make any hasty decision or assessments, but stay faithful to its long-held principles," the official said.
yonngong@yna.co.kr
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