North Korea returns to peace talks

SEOUL, July 30 (UPI) -- After a weeklong war of words, North Korea and the U.N. Command met in Panmunjom, a hamlet on the frontier separating the two Koreas.

Colonels from both sides sat down to discuss how they could restart stalled negotiations to secure peace on the peninsular between the nations that are technically still at war since the 1953 cease-fire.

Issues discussed included the highly contentious sinking of a South Korean warship allegedly by a North Korean submarine, a U.N. Command statement said.

The torpedo sinking of the Cheonan corvette in March near the disputed inter-Korean border cost the lives of 46 South Korean sailors.

Tensions rose dramatically this summer after a major international investigation pinned the blame on North Korea. But the hard-line communist government in Pyongyang has consistently denied any involvement.

The North Korean government also was vociferous this week in its condemnation of a four-day military exercise by South Korean and U.S. forces that included naval and air movements close to the demilitarized border.

At one point Pyongyang threatened military action, a move that prompted its staunchest ally China to ask for calm by all sides.

At a meeting of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations in the Vietnamese capital Hanoi last week, a senior North Korean delegate declared the exercises as hostile.

The exercises in the Sea of Japan, to the east of the Korean peninsula, included the nuclear-powered aircraft carrier the USS George Washington, 20 other ships and submarines, and around 100 aircraft.

U.S. Gen. Walter Sharp, commander of the 28,500 U.S. troops in South Korea who leads the South Korean-based U.S.-led U.N. Command, said the maneuvers were defensive in nature but also "designed to send a clear message to North Korea that its aggressive behavior must stop."

In the wake of the Cheonan incident, the United States increased its trade sanctions against North Korea, a move denounced by Pyongyang.

"The sanctions are a direct expression of intensified hostility," North Korean spokesman Ri Tong Il said. "The U.S. should make concrete steps toward engaging in dialogue if it is serious about ridding the Korean peninsula of nuclear weapons."

However, he said North Korea is willing to returning to the stalled six-party talks with China, Japan, Russia, South Korea and the United States on North Korea's nuclear weapons program.

The group hasn't met since December 2008.

But North Korea's willingness to restart talks, as well as discuss the Cheonan incident, with the U.N. Command is an indication that tensions may be easing at last, some analysts said.

This week Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Defense Secretary Robert Gates were visiting the "border truce village" of Panmunjom where talks were taking place.

They were under the watchful and curious gaze of North Korean soldiers when they visited the Military Armistice Commission meeting room in a rectangular building. The structure has one door opening out to the South and another door leading to the North.

The border runs down the middle of the room's long conference table where for many years both sides have sat facing each other for their talks.