By Kang Hyun-kyung
Staff Reporter
South Korea proposed Tuesday that North Korea introduce a day-pass system for South Korean workers and allow them to access the Internet at the joint Gaeseong Industrial Complex in the North.
During working-level talks at the complex, Seoul asked Pyongyang to allow South Korean workers to be able to move freely at the complex all day if they get a permit, an official of the Ministry of Unification in Seoul said.
The South Korean delegation composed of five officials from the Ministries of Unification and National Defense also proposed the availability of the Internet service at the Gaeseong site.
The North's responses to the South's requests have yet to be known.
Officials from the two sides met to discuss ways of facilitating communications, and streamlining procedures needed for the clearance of customs and the passage of South Koreans to and from the complex.
They met twice on Tuesday. In the morning session, the two sides presented their position regarding the agendas.
After taking a recess, they sat down again to negotiate the specifics of communications, clearance of customs and South Korean workers' access to the complex.
Lee Kang-woo, chief South Korean delegate, asked the North Korean delegation to give details of four South Koreans held by the North, the official said. Pyongyang's response was not known immediately.
The North Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported last week that the authorities held the South Koreans for entering its territory illegally.
The KCNA neither identified the trespassers nor elaborated on how and when they entered the communist state.
No concrete information was available on their identification.
South Korea's Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade has said that none of the South Korean citizens currently residing in North Korea were among the four detained.
South Koreans in the North are either aid workers or businessmen who have won approval from the government to travel there, the foreign ministry said.
hkang@koreatimes.co.kr
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