South Korea Reviews Various Options To Improve Relations With North Korea

One side of the North Korea-South Korea border. (Wikimedia Commons//Republic of Korea Armed Forces)

JAKARTA - South Korea is studying various plans to improve relations with North Korea, a spokesman for South Korea's Unification Ministry said Monday, responding to media reports that Seoul was considering allowing individual tours of North Korea.

Byung-sam's Koo, a ministry spokesman who handles inter-Korean affairs, declined to comment on "certain issues".

However, Koo said he understood that individual tours did not violate international sanctions.

Tourism is one of the few sources of revenue for North Korea that has not been targeted by the United Nations for its nuclear and weapons programs.

South Korean President Lee Jae-myung himself has promised to improve tense relations with Pyongyang which have reached their worst level in recent years.

In an effort to ease tensions, President Lee suspended broadcasts of North anti-Korean loudspeakers along the border and ordered the termination of a leaflet campaign criticizing North Korean leaders by anti-Pyongyang activists.

President Lee also said he would discuss further plans with top security officials to resume dialogue with North Korea, which is technically at war with South Korea.

North Korea recently opened a beach resort in Wonsan City, a flagship project initiated by leader Kim Jong-un to promote tourism.

However, the tourist area temporarily does not accept foreign visitors, according to records dated July 16 from the DPR Korea Tour, a website operated by North Korea's National Tourism Administration.

North Korea needs to first open the area to the outside world, said a spokesman for the Unification Ministry, who asked whether South Koreans could travel to Wonsan.

To note, South Korea once toured the Mount Kumgang area of North Korea, but suspended it in 2008, when a South Korean tourist was shot dead by a North Korean soldier.