Kim Nam-shik, a Unification Ministry spokesman, told a news briefing on ongoing talks between the South and North Korean premiers that there was "growing understanding between the sides for the start of cargo rail service".
The rail service would deliver goods produced in the Gaeseong Industrial Complex, jointly run by South and North Korea, and located in the North's border town of Kaeson. Goods would be delivered to South Korea's Munsan and North Korea's Bongdong. The industrial complex produces over $1 million worth of shoes, garments and other labor-intensive goods each month.
The two Koreas conducted a test-run of the Munsan-Bongdong line in May, and South Korean freight has already been successfully delivered to Bongdong.
North Korea's Prime Minister Kim Yong-il is in Seoul for three-day talks with his South Korean counterpart, Han Duck-Soo, as a follow-up to a milestone inter-Korean summit in Pyongyang early last month, when the leaders of the divided Koreas failed to set a date for the launch of the service. The current talks are set to last until Friday.
In an interview with the Yonhap agency earlier this month, Lee Chul, the head of South Korea's national rail service KORAIL, underlined the economic boost the inter-Korean cargo service could provide. He said it would take over nearly all the transportation in bilateral trade. He also added that when connected to the railroads of China and Russia, the rail link would dramatically increase shipment capacity.
The prime minister also agreed at Thursday's talks to set up a joint committee to oversee a peace zone in the disputed border area in the West Sea, one of the key summit accords, Kim Nam-shik said.
Pyongyang does not acknowledge the sea border, unilaterally set by the U.S.-led United Nations Command at the end of the 1950-53 Korean War. Naval skirmishes occurred in 1999 and 2002 in the waters near the border.
The prime ministerial talks, the first in 15 years, come as the Communist state has begun to disable its sole operational nuclear reactor under a February denuclearization deal with the United States, South Korea, China, Russia and Japan.
