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(2nd LD) Koreas to hold joint int'l survey for Kaesong park
By Kim Hyun
SEOUL, Nov. 26 (Yonhap) -- South and North Korea will send a joint survey team to China and Vietnam next month to try to find an international model that can help facilitate the development of their shared factory park, a senior official here said Thursday.
The joint trip, set for mid-December, may be a sign that the North intends to continue its conciliatory diplomacy toward South Korea despite a spate of recent decisions by Seoul that have angered Pyongyang.
"The joint survey has been agreed upon, and we are still talking about details," the top official at the Unification Ministry told reporters at a background briefing.
"We have yet to set up a very detailed schedule," he said, "But we are thinking of industrial parks in China and Vietnam."
North Korea recently agreed to hold the international survey, which was proposed by the South after payment disputes arose over the joint park in the North Korean border town of Kaesong, the official said.
The joint trip would be a watershed for the Kaesong park, whose fate once hung by a thread amid political tensions earlier this year. Inter-Korean relations rapidly chilled after the conservative government of Lee Myung-bak came to power in Seoul last year and became further strained after the North's nuclear test in May.
North Korea shifted to a more conciliatory stance in August, reaching out to Seoul and Washington for dialogue and lifting restrictions on inter-Korean business ventures.
But North Korean media recently resumed their vitriolic criticism of Seoul, pointing to its prolonged suspension of a lucrative North Korean mountain tour and its participation in a U.N. resolution condemning the North's human rights condition. The North called South Korean Unification Minister Hyun In-taek, who is in charge of inter-Korean relations, a "traitor" impeding cross-border relations.
The top official defended decisions by the Seoul government, saying its North Korea policy is flexible and that inter-Korean dialogue is quietly taking place out of public view.
"Some may think our government's stance is too hard-line. For example, they may say, 'Why are there so many conditions when North Korea wants to resume the Mount Kumgang tour?'" the official said. "But that is not the only aspect of current inter-Korean relations. Dialogue is going well, and there are various currents going on in inter-Korean relations."
The official said the two Koreas will team up with about 10 people on each side for the survey.
In April, North Korea complained of low wages and land fees paid by South Korean firms at the joint park, which opened in 2004. Several rounds of unsuccessful negotiations ensued, with North demanding a four-fold increase in the monthly wage for North Korean workers to US$300.
In June, South Korea proposed joint inspections abroad to help North Korea learn international business customs and aid the two sides in narrowing their differences. Under the proposal, the joint team is to visit foreign-invested complexes in China and Vietnam first, then Central Asia and finally the United States and other advanced countries.
The Koreas made a similar trip before relations chilled in 2007, during which seven officials from both sides toured industrial facilities in China and Vietnam for 10 days.
Businesses operating in Kaesong welcomed the agreement.
"North Korean officials don't go overseas very much, so they don't know how well-equipped the Kaesong park is by international standards," Ok Sung-seok, chief of Nine Mode Co., a clothing maker.
"They demand more, but in my view, there's no other place that is better than Kaesong."
The joint park, just north of the inter-Korean border, hosts 116 South Korean firms employing more than 40,800 North Koreans. Factories there produce mostly labor-intensive goods such as electronics, clothing and kitchenware. An average North Korean worker currently earns about $80.
The Kaesong venture is a major result of the historic first inter-Korean summit in 2000.
hkim@yna.co.kr
(END)
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