Koreas to meet at village straddling border in bid to lower tension

PanARMENIAN.Net - North and South Korea will meet Sunday, June 9 at a village straddling their heavily armed border as the sides try to lower tension and restore projects once seen as symbols of their rapprochement, officials said.

The North delivered its agreement Saturday to hold talks at Panmunjom through a Red Cross line restored a day earlier, the Unification Ministry said in a text message. Pyongyang had earlier favored its border city of Kaesong as the venue.

The agreement to hold the first government-level contact on the peninsula since early 2011 is the latest sign that tension is easing between the countries after Pyongyang threatened to attack South Korea and the United States with nuclear missiles earlier this year.

It also comes as President Barack Obama meets with Chinese President Xi Jinping in California. Xi late last month met with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un's special envoy in Beijing and received a statement from him that Pyongyang was willing to return to dialogue.

Xi will meet South Korean President Park Geun-hye later this month.

China provides the lifeline for North Korea struggling with energy and other economic needs and views stability in Pyongyang as crucial for its own economy and border security. But after Pyongyang conducted its third nuclear test in February, China tightened its cross-border trade inspections and banned its state banks from dealing with North Korea's Foreign Trade Bank, AP reported.