South, North Korea to resume talks at 3 p.m.

(ATTN: RECASTS lead, headline; UPDATES with talks to resume)
SEOUL, June 11 (Yonhap) -- Officials from South and North Korea exchanged their
positions over a troubled joint industrial park on Thursday, though there were
few signs that the rare talks would lead to a breakthrough amid tensions on the
peninsula.

The two sides agreed to resume their talks at 3 p.m. after the first round ended
in 50 minutes in the morning, Unification Ministry spokeswoman Lee Jong-joo said.
Lee could not say whether there was any progress. South Korea raised the issue of
a detained South Korean worker while the North presented its new operating terms
for the joint park, which is on North Korean soil in the border town of Kaesong,
she said.
The rare talks are a follow-up to an April meeting -- the first government-level
dialogue in more than a year -- which broke down due to agenda differences.
During that brief meeting, North Korea demanded wage hikes and contract revisions
regarding the joint park but refused to discuss Seoul's major concern, the
Hyundai Asan Corp. employee who was detained in Kaesong in March for a "dishonest
hostile act" against the communist regime.
The joint venture, just an hour's drive from Seoul, hosts 106 South Korean
manufacturers and is the last remaining inter-Korean cooperative project.
hkim@yna.co.kr
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