S. Korea not yet mulling higher-level talks with N. Korea: ministry

(ATTN: UPDATES throughout with diplomatic efforts on detainee, statement on N.
Korea's missile test)
By Lee Chi-dong
SEOUL, July 3 (Yonhap) -- South Korea has no plan yet to push for higher-level
meetings with North Korea despite little progress in on-and-off working-level
talks over the operation of a joint industrial complex there, the Unification
Ministry said Friday.

The ministry was responding to growing doubts about the efficacy of the talks
between director-general-level officials from the two Koreas, whose latest round
was held on Thursday but produced no agreement. No date for a next round was set.
The North has demanded that monthly wages for its 40,000 workers at about 100
South Korean middle-and small-sized firms at the Kaesong industrial park be
quadrupled to US$300. It is also calling for an increase in rent for the estate
to $500 million from the current $16 million under a 50-year contract. South
Korea made it clear that such demands are unacceptable.
During the three rounds of formal negotiations in recent weeks, South Korean
representatives urged the North to first release a South Korean worker,
identified by his family name Yu, who has been detained in the North since late
March on charges of criticizing the communist nation's political system. Seoul
views the detention as a key issue on the operation of the fragile joint venture,
once a token of detente on the divided peninsula.
The North has snubbed the South's requests to release the worker, even refusing
to let him to meet his family and South Korean officials.
Many agree that the two Koreas are unlikely to reach a compromise in the near
future.
The ministry said, however, that it is premature to seek a higher-level dialogue
with the North.
"It is a matter related to the general situation of South and North Korean
relations," ministry spokesman Chun Hae-sung said at a press briefing. "The
matter of Yu's detention is not a matter involving the format of negotiations.
"For now, we are not considering the issue of upgrading the level of talks."
The two Koreas had a pair of summits between their leaders in 2000 and 2007, in
which they agreed to a set of tension-easing measures and joint economic
projects. The two sides had relatively frequent meetings at Cabinet level,
including talks between defense ministers during the past decade, when the South
was ruled by liberal administrations.
Inter-Korean ties turned frosty with the launch of the conservative Lee Myung-bak
government, which linked its approach towards Pyongyang with progress in efforts
to denuclearize it.
The working-level talks on the industrial zone are the first and only
face-to-face consultation channel between the government officials of the two
Koreas under the Lee administration that took power early last year.
Chun said his ministry favors a bilateral solution to the detainee issue, but has
no other choice than to support the foreign ministry's plan to raise it at the
ASEAN Regional Forum -- to be held in Thailand later this month -- unless the
problem is resolved by then.
Foreign Minister Yu Myung-hwan told reporters Thursday that he will put forward
the detention issue at the meeting with his counterparts from about two dozen
nations including the ASEAN member countries, the U.S., China, Russia, and Japan.
Chun also condemned the North's firing of four short-range missiles into the East
Sea on the day the two Koreas were holding talks on the Kaesong complex.
"Such a step by North Korea to escalate tension is unhelpful to the stable
maintenance of the Kaesong industrial complex and the development of South and
North Korean relations," he said. "We hope North Korea will not take this kind of
measure any more."
lcd@yna.co.kr
(END)