South and North Korea Leaders to Hold Summit

North and South Korea have announced that their leaders will meet later this month in Pyongyang for the first summit between the two countries in seven years.

South Korea's presidential security adviser, Baek Jong-chun, told reporters in Seoul Wednesday that President Roh Moo-hyun will meet with North Korean leader Kim Jong Il for three days of talks beginning August 28.

North Korea's official Korean Central News Agency confirmed the meeting in a statement Wednesday. It said officials from both countries would meet at the border city of Kaesong in North Korea to make arrangements for the summit.

The two countries last held a summit in June 2000, when Mr. Kim met then South Korean President Kim Dae-Jung in Pyongyang.

The meeting led to unprecedented cooperation between North and South Korea, though the two nations remain technically at war because their 1950s conflict ended only in a truce.

The countries have lived for decades with landmines dividing the peninsula and more than one million troops near the demilitarized zone that divides them.

ENDS

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