A group of South Korean government officials and civilians crossed into the North Korea border town of Kaesong Wednesday for the second day in a row to work on repairs for a liaison office that the two Koreas recently agreed to open for better communication, the unification ministry said.

The 17-member team included ministry officials and staff of Hyundai Asan, a company that played a key role in past inter-Korean economic cooperation projects.

They toured the area on Tuesday to prepare for repair works on buildings, including a potential lodging facility whose basement was under water.

After their preparatory work, the ministry said that its staff and construction workers will stay there and carry out repair and renovation of the facilities before the launch of the office.

In a high-level officials' meeting on June 1, the two Koreas agreed to open the liaison office "at an early date" to brace for increased cross-border exchanges following their leaders' summit meetings in April and May.

According to a source, South Korea is pushing to open the liaison office by mid-August. He said that the timetable was reported at a Wednesday meeting of officials from the presidential office, the government and the ruling party.

On June 8, South Korean officials conducted an initial on-site inspection in Kaesong and found that some of the buildings and equipment were not operating properly or needed repairs.

Kaesong is where the two Koreas operated a joint industrial complex. Launched in 2004, the complex was hailed as a successful case of economic cooperation between the two Koreas as it combined the South's capital with the North's cheap and skillful labor.

Seoul, however, brought back all of its people from the complex in February 2016 following the North's missile and nuclear provocations. (Yonhap)