NORTH, SOUTH KOREA SET DIRECT TALKS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP05T02051R000200350084-9
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: August 12, 2011
• Sequence Number: 84
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

I'lhSHINGTON POST__
NEb) YORK TIMES
lJALI. STREET JOURNAAL
PIASHINGTON TIMES
USA TODAY '
Approved For Release 2011/08/12 : CIA-RDP05TO2051 R000200350084-9
North, South Korea Set Direct Talks
By Fred Hiatt North Korea now says it will join Cuba, Vietnam and
Washington Post Foreign Service three other communist allies in l,ycotting the Games.
SEOUL, Aug. 10-North Korea and South Korea But Pyongyang's most important allies, China and the
accord-
today appeared headed toward their first direct talks in mg Union, are sending athletes to Seoul and, accord-
more than two years, but the development generated g to U.S. officials, are urging North Korea not to dis-
scant hope for improved relations or for North Korean rupt the Games.
participation in next month's Olympic Games. The North's boycott has prompted fears here and in
South Korean leaders indicated today that they will Washington that Pyongyang may seek to sabotage the
accept the latest proposal from North Korea for a small, Games through terrorism. Those fears have led the
preliminary meeting at the Demilitarized Zone next U.S. to promise an increased air and naval presence in
week. The two Koreas, hostile neighbors since their civil the region during the Games.
war ended in a standoff in 1953, have been exchanging The prospect of direct negotiations between the two
proposals for such a meeting for more than a month. sides, even if they achieve little, has raised Seoul's
The planned Aug. 19 session would include five par- hopes that tensions may be eased for the Games. If the
liamentary officials from each side and is intended to set talks are at least polite, one diplomat said, "it could help
an agenda for a larger meeting later this month. That the world see that the Korean peninsula is not going to
meeting would take place either here or in Pyongyang, blow up and that would be good for the Olympics."
the North Korean capital. The two nations still disagree South Korean officials also hope the talks will defuse
about the size, membership and agenda for the later the efforts of leftist students who have been demon-
meeting, however.
"Anytime the North and South get together and strating for unification.
meet, since it happens so rarely, it's encouraging," a Analysts here said North Korea is unlikely to change
western diplomat here said. "Yet the distance is so Its mind about the boycott, and Olympic officials have
wide, it's hard to predict much prpgress." said that it is too late to arrange for any events to be
"There have been preliminary meetings before, but not staged in North Korea.
much has come of them," agreed Kim Young Jak, a po- An Asian diplomat said that North Korea, with its
litical science professor at Kookmin University. "We are closed and ideologically rigid society, would not risk
naturally very cautious about North Korea's intentions." allowing its athletes to see the prosperity and relative
North Korea broke off the last direct talks in January freedom of South Korea.
1986, citing an annual U.S.-South Korean militery ex- "You can't have 300 youngsters walking around
ercise as provocation. Since then, the two nations have Pyongyang talking about what they've seen in Seoul,"
communicated indirectly through the International the diplomat said.
Ol
i
C
i
ymp
c
omm
ttee in a failed effort to negotiate North
Korea's demand to cohost the Olympics, set to begin
here Sept. 17.
Washington Post special correspondent Peter Maass
contributed to this report.
Approved For Release 2011/08/12 : CIA-RDP05TO2051 R000200350084-9