(2nd LD) South, North Korea hold talks over joint park

(ATTN: UPDATES with start of talks, next round likely to be scheduled)
By Kim Hyun
SEOUL, July 2 (Yonhap) -- Officials from South and North Korea met on Thursday to
try to narrow differences over a joint industrial park and the fate of a detained
worker, as the dialogue could stretch on indefinitely amid few signs of a
breakthrough.
The talks are being held as North Korea faces tightening financial sanctions by
the outside world for its May 25 nuclear test. The inter-Korean industrial park
has provided the North with a steady cash flow.
"We will agree on things that can be agreed on, and for things that are hard to
agree on, we will put them aside and take our time," Kim Young-tak, head of South
Korea's 16-member delegation said before heading to the North.
The talks started at 10 a.m. at the joint park in the North's border town of
Kaesong, Unification Ministry spokesman Chun Hae-sung said.
Speculation has grown that North Korea may toughen its position on the case of
the detained South Korean worker which it has refused to discuss. The Hyundai
Asan Corp. engineer who works at the joint park has been held incommunicado since
March on accusations of "slandering" the North's political system. North Korea
has said he must first be investigated before it decides on his fate. Amnesty
International has called for his immediate release.
Over the first two rounds on June 11 and June 19, the two sides exchanged their
respective demands and proposals, with Thursday's talks expected to be a litmus
test for the possibility of narrowing differences.
In the first round, North Korea demanded South Korean firms raise monthly wages
four-fold to US$300. It also sought $500 million for a 50-year lease on the park,
overriding inter-Korean contracts under which South Korean developers paid $16
million when the park opened in 2004.
In the second round, North Korea insisted on its initial demands, but eased up on
non-cash issues. The North offered to lift a border traffic curfew it imposed on
South Korean workers and cargo trucks in December in protest over Seoul's
conservative policy.
South Korea offered to build a dormitory and a nursery for North Korean workers,
mostly women in their 20s and 30s. It also proposed a joint survey on foreign
investment zones in China and the United States to improve the business viability
of the inter-Korean venture. Concerning the wage and rent demands, President Lee
Myung-bak has rejected them as "unacceptable."
"On June 11th, the North presented many agenda items, and on the 19th, we talked
a lot," Kim said. "Today, I expect there will be a flurry of discussions."
"Unless an agreement is reached, the talks should continue, and I think the date
(for the next round) will be set as the talks proceed," he said.
The industrial park is the last surviving cross-border venture born out of the
first summit between South and North Korean leaders in 2000. Tourism projects
that took South Koreans to the North's historic and scenic spots were all
suspended last year as political relations unraveled after Lee took office.
The joint park hosts more than 100 South Korean firms making clothing,
kitchenware, electronic equipment and other labor-intensive goods with about
40,000 North Korean workers. The firms paid more than $26 million in wages to the
North Korean government last year.
hkim@yna.co.kr
(END)