Seoul's Unification Ministry delegation arrive in Pyongyang for talks

(27 Feb 2007) SHOTLIST 1. Traffic in Pyongyang street 2. Car driving in front of poster 3. Close up of poster reading: ''Let us thoroughly carry out the socialist cause with Songun Idea of the great General!'' 4. People walking in street 5. Picture of President Kim Il Sung smiling 6. Close of President Kim II Sung 7. People in the street 8. Various of people making phone calls 9. Wide of Pyongyang airport 10. Close of portrait of President Kim Il Sung 11. Plane on tarmac carrying South Korean Unification Minister and his entourage 12. Air traffic control worker on runway directing plane as it lands 13. Plane taxing along 14. Press waiting on runway 14. North Korean delegates waiting 15. Woman holding a bouquet of flowers. 16. Various of South Korean delegates walking down the plane steps 17. Various of Lee Jae-joung, South Korea's Unification Minister being greeted and being given a bouquet of flowers 20. South Korean delegates posing for a photo 21. Cutaway of Press and North Korean officials standing on runway 22. South Korean delegation posing for a photo 23. Traffic driving through Pyongyang's Arch of Triumph STORYLINE A South Korean delegation arrived Tuesday in North Korea for the first high-level talks between the two countries in seven months, paving the way for a resumption of aid to impoverished Pyongyang after it pledged to start dismantling its nuclear weapons programme. The South Korean leadership, in the meantime, stressed the importance of reassuring Pyongyang that abandoning its nuclear weapons is in its own interest. APTN North Korea filmed Seoul's delegation led by the Unification Minister, Lee Jae-joung, being welcomed in Pyongyang in the afternoon (local time) ahead of Wednesday's resumed Cabinet-level meetings - the highest channel of dialogue between the Koreas. It is the first substantive sign of eased tensions on the divided peninsula since Pyongyang's Feb. 13 agreement at international arms talks to shut down its main nuclear reactor within 60 days. The high-level talks were last held in July, when the South refused to continue aid to the North after it test-fired a series of missiles. The countries' relations further soured after the North tested a nuclear weapon in October. The two sides were to have an official dinner Tuesday night before the formal start of talks Wednesday. At this week's talks, the two sides will discuss how to cooperate in implementing the Feb. 13 agreement, South Korean Unification Minister Lee Jae-joung said Tuesday before his departure for the talks that run through Friday. That agreement calls for a separate forum on bringing peace to the Korean peninsula, which has remained technically in a state of war since the 1953 cease-fire that ended the Korean War. The first and only summit between the two Koreas was held in 2000 between then-South Korean President Kim Dae-jung and North Korean leader Kim Jong Il in Pyongyang. Another key issue in this week's meetings, the 20th such Cabinet-level talks, will be whether the North allows a test run of trains on rebuilt tracks through the heavily armed frontier dividing the peninsula. A planned test run was put off last year because the North Korean military said proper security arrangements had not been made. Find out more about AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/HowWeWork Twitter:   / ap_archive   Facebook:   / aparchives   ​​ Instagram:   / apnews   You can license this story through AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/metadata/you...