The Korea Herald

지나쌤

S. Korean officials to visit N. Korea for family reunion event

By KH디지털2

Published : Oct. 14, 2015 - 13:43

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More than a dozen South Korean officials will visit North Korea this week to prepare for the upcoming family reunion event, the Unification Ministry said Wednesday.

Families split by the 1950-53 Korean War and continued division of the Korean Peninsula are scheduled to reunite in special meetings to be held at Mount Kumgang on the North's east coast from Oct. 20-26. It's part of a deal reached at high-level talks in late August that deescalated heightened military tension at the time.

The 14-member advance team, led by a senior Red Cross official, plans to cross the border at noon on Thursday for the one-day mission. It will inspect the venue and fine-tune a specific timetable for the meetings, related logistics and other details, according to the ministry.

Around 200 elderly South Koreans will be given a rare chance to meet their families in the communist North in the first inter-Korean family reunions since February 2014.

The border between the two Koreas remains tightly sealed as they are technically at war. The Korean War ended in a truce, not a peace treaty. (Yonhap)