SKorea to discuss Korean War issue

SEOUL, Nov. 3 (UPI) -- South Korean Foreign Minister Song Min-soon will discuss ways to formally end the 1950-53 Korean War during his U.S. trip, it was announced Saturday.

Song, in his meeting with U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice Wednesday, will discuss both the Korean War, which ended only in an armistice, and the disabling of North Korea’s main nuclear facility, which is set to begin Monday, Yonhap news agency reported the government as saying.

The war issue has gained importance since the leaders of the two Koreas held a summit in early October for setting up a Korean Peninsular zone of peace. Since the Korean War did not produce a peace treaty, the two countries are technically in a state of war and any effort to sign one will require the approval of the United States and China.

The Song-Rice meeting also is expected to help their countries devise ways to get North Korea, which detonated a nuclear device last year, to give up its nuclear weapons and plutonium stockpile.

Separately, Yonhap reported South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun telling a Japanese newspaper a declaration on the Korean War can be made even before North Korea's nuclear disabling is verified.