Two Koreas in fresh talks on next month’s Winter Olympics in South

SEOUL: North and South Korea began talks yesterday on performances by Pyongyang’s state artistic troupes at next month’s Winter Olympics in the South, after the North agreed to attend the Games.

Pyongyang agreed last week to send athletes, high-level officials and others to the Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang, easing months of high tensions over its weapons programmes.

The two sides agreed an art troupe would be part of the delegation. Four officials from each country started a workinglevel meeting to thrash out details on the northern side of the border village of Panmunjom soon after 10am (0100 GMT), Seoul’s unification ministry said.

The North’s delegates include Kwon Hyok-Bong, a senior culture ministry official, as well as Hyon Song-Wol, the leader of the North’s famed all-female Moranbong music band.

The 10-strong band, established in 2012 with members supposedly chosen by leader Kim Jong-Un, is known for its Western-style, synthesiser-driven music and sophisticated fashion style rare in the isolated nation, although most of their songs praise the regime.

Their numbers include the jaunty ‘Mother’s Birthday’, about the ruling Workers’ Party of Korea, and the more soulful ‘We Call Him Father’, an ode to leader Kim Jong-Un.

Such lyrics could fall foul of the South’s National Security Act, which bans praise for the North.

The band once cancelled a planned performance in Beijing in 2015 and returned home after Chinese officials took issue with propaganda images on stage featuring Pyongyang’s long-range missiles.

Seoul should negotiate carefully to avoid the embarrassment of having the North’s propaganda being promoted at the Olympics, said Cheong Seong-Chang, analyst at the Sejong Institute think tank.

“If the Moranbong band members, all formally military officers, come to the South in military uniforms, it could cause discomfort among many South Koreans,” Cheong said.

“And it would stir an even bigger controversy if any praise of Kim Jong-Un or missile launches are featured on the stage during their performance,” he said in a statement.

The two Koreas are set to hold talks with the International Olympics Committee in Lausanne, Switzerland, on Saturday over the number of the North’s athletes.

South Korea has proposed a joint march for the opening ceremony and a unified women’s ice hockey team, reports quoted a minister as saying last week. — AFP