Korean family reunions to resum after two-year break

Sep 25, 2009, 13:02 GMT

Seoul - Families separated by the division of the Korean peninsula into North and South Korea are given another brief chance of reunion on Saturday, following a two-year break.

The reunions, scheduled from Saturday until Thursday, are to take place in a holiday resort in the Kumgang mountains on North Korea's east coast.

They are another indication of thawing relations between the two Koreas, following months rising tension. North Korea mothballed reunions in 2007 as relations soured after Pyongyang conduced a nuclear test and also test-fired missiles.

The Defence Ministry in Seoul said 97 elderly South Koreans, separated from their relatives since Korea's division in 1945 and the following 1950-53 Korean War, assembled in the South Koran city of Sokcho on Friday.

From there they will be driven across the heavily guarded inter-Korean border to meet with about 270 lost spouses, siblings or other relatives. On Tuesday, 99 North Koreans are to meet with their Southern relatives.

About 200 families, or 910 individuals, will be brought together by the reunions, which were negotiated by Red Cross organizations in both countries in late August.

The meetings are to take place in the presence of North Korean minders, who are likely to monitor their conversations.

More than three quarters of the Southern participants, which were selected randomly by computer from more than 127,000 applicants are aged 70 or older.

Since reunions started following a landmark North-South summit in 2000, more than 16,200 Koreans were allowed to briefly meet their relatives.

The affected families, of which there are hundreds of thousands, have been completely cut off from their relatives, as there is no cross-border contact possible via letter, telephone or email.