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2009/09/16 18:19 KST
N. Korea marks completion of joint tech university: report

  
SEOUL, Sept. 16 (Yonhap) -- North Korea held a ceremony Wednesday marking the completion of a science university jointly built with donations from the South, the North's media reported.

   The North's Korea Central News Agency reported the event was held to celebrate the completion of the Pyongyang University of Science and Technology, whose construction was started in 2002. Jon Kuk-man, North Korea's vice minister of education, and other education officials attended the event.

   The university was built with donations collected over the years from the South to help train young North Koreans with advanced technology and boost inter-Korean reconciliation. But it is still unclear when the school will open, with South Korea withholding faculty exchanges and shipments of computers amid the diplomatic stalemate over the North's nuclear drive.

   A day earlier, the South Korean government gave permission for the 20-member delegation -- including an aide to President Lee Myung-bak and people mostly from a religious foundation -- to attend the ceremony.

   The visiting team was led by Kim Jin-kyung, president of the Yanbian University of Science and Technology in the Korean autonomous prefecture of Yanbian, northeastern China. Kim has been designated as president of the university.

   odissy@yna.co.kr
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