Hyundai Group Chairwoman Hyun Jung-eun has extended her North Korea stay to Friday, raising the possibility that she has yet to meet North Korean leader Kim Jong-il.

Hyun was due to return to Seoul Thursday afternoon, ending a trip that had already been extended by one day.

South Korea's Unification Ministry said Hyun seemed not to have met the reclusive leader who was reportedly out of Pyongyang, the North's capital. She is expected to secure the release of a Hyundai worker who has been detained since late March.

"I just received a phone call (from Hyun's entourage in Pyongyang). Chairman Hyun extended her stay for one more day," Cho Kun-shik, chief of Hyundai Asan, the group's North Korea business arm, was quoted as telling reporters before heading to Gaeseong, North Korea's border city where a joint industrial park is located. Hyun drove to Pyongyang Monday.

The Hyundai Asan employee, identified only as Yu, is being detained incommunicado on accusations of criticizing the North's political system and trying to persuade a local woman to defect to the South.

Hyundai is suffering huge losses due to its North Korea tour projects that were suspended last year as inter-Korean relations went sour.

Hyun was widely expected to meet with Kim, though the delay suggests that negotiations over her agenda may not be going smoothly. The two met twice in 2005 and 2007 to seal tour deals.

Experts believe she will also play a mediating role between President Lee Myung-bak and the North Korean leader.