First talks in two years for two Koreas

SEOUL: North and South Korea agreed more than two years, hours after Seoul and Washington decided to defer joint military exercises which always infuriate Pyongyang until after the Winter Olympics.

The meeting, the first since Panmunjom, the truce village in Zone that divides the peninsula.

South Korean President Moon Jae-In said that “overly optimistic expectations” were “undesirable” but added: “We will do our best to make the Pyeongchang Olympics an Olympics for peace and settle the nuclear issue peacefully.”

Tensions have been high after the North carried out multiple - ing a number of ICBMs, and its sixth atomic test, by far its most powerful to date.

The tentative rapprochement comes after the North’s leader Kim Jong-Un warned in his New Year speech that he had a nuclear button on his desk, but at the same time offered Seoul an olive branch, saying Pyongyang could send a team to next month’s Games in the South.

Seoul responded with an offer of talks and earlier this week the hotline between them was restored after being suspended for almost two years.

Late Thursday, Moon and his US counterpart Donald Trump agreed to delay the giant Foal Eagle and Key Resolve joint military drills until after the Winter Olympics, which begin in Pyeongchang on February 9.

That announcement came hours after Trump said high-level talks between North and South would be “a good thing”—although the US has long insisted that it will not negotiate with Pyongyang unless it disarmament.

it had received a fax from Ri SonGwon, head of the North’s Com of Korea, a state agency handling inter-Korean affairs, saying: “We will come to the Peace House at Panmunjom on January 9.”

The Peace House is a South Korean- built building on the southern side of Panmunjom, where troops from the two sides face off against each other across a concrete dividing line.

Ministry spokesman Baek TaeHyun told journalists that the size and composition of the delegations would be settled by fax.

“I understand the North is also going to have talks with the International Olympic Committee next week,” he added.

spike, with Kim and Trump trading personal insults and threats of war, and the US president responded to Kim’s New Year message with a Tweet that his nuclear button was “much bigger and more powerful”, prompting scorn and alarm from analysts.

Concerns over North Korea have overshadowed the Winter Games, which Seoul and the organizers have proclaimed a “peace Olympics”, urging Pyongyang to participate, in the South, which it boycotted.

Tensions always rise during the annual drills, which Pyongyang condemns as preparations for invasion and often responds to with provocations. Beijing and Moscow both see the exercises as adding to regional tensions.

But recent days have seen a rare softening of tone on both sides.