Two Koreas Seek Deal for Formal End to Korean War

[Hissyspit]

Source: Reuters

Two Koreas seek deal for formal end to Korean War
By Jessica Kim
1 hour, 51 minutes ago

SEOUL (Reuters) - The leaders of North and South Korea pledged on Thursday to bring peace to the Cold War's last frontier by seeking talks with China and the United States to formally end the 1950-1953 Korean War.

The agreement came at the end of only the second summit between the divided Koreas whose war ended with an armistice not a peace treaty.

"North and South Korea shared the view they must end the current armistice and build a permanent peace regime," South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun and North Korean leader Kim Jong-il said in a joint statement at the end of their three-day meeting in Pyongyang.

The agreement also called for setting up the first regular freight train service since the war, meetings of ministers and defense officials as well as establishing a cooperation zone around a contested sea border on the west of the peninsula.

Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20071004/ts_nm/korea_summit_peace_dc

[More Than A Feeling]

1. I hope they agree to keep the DMZ uninhabited

It's an ecological treasure-house, after the fifty-plus year absence of the heavy hand of humankind.

[davepc]

2. except for the land minds and razor wire

[MADem]

3. It sure is. I 've seen some fascinating stuff on that area.

It would be a helluva wildlife refuge, a memorial to a rough time, too. A point of pain becoming a point of pride....

[cboy4]

4. Interesting what happens when leaders talk and reason with

each other, as opposed to bombing they hell out of the other one.

Sadly, the idiot in the White House will ignore this success story.

[onehandle]

5. This is something Condoleezza Rice wouldn't have the talent to achieve in a million years.

Talk about a failure.

[eridani]

6. Looks like they are doing fine without us

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/100507J.shtml

North Korea pledged to detail its nuclear programs and disable all activities at its main reactor complex by year's end, then signed a wide-ranging reconciliation pact with South Korea Thursday promising to finally seek a peace treaty to replace the 1953 cease-fire that ended the Korean War.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Il and South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun also said they would open regular links across their heavily fortified border under the deal struck a day after the North made its firmest commitment yet to nuclear disarmament.

Kim and Roh signed the wide-ranging agreement promising cooperation for peace after three days of summit meetings in Pyongyang, the second such meeting between the countries.

They shook hands and posed for the cameras. Roh then took Kim's right hand in his left and raised both their arms in the air like champion prizefighters before the two shared a champagne toast.

"The South and North shared the view that they should end the current armistice regime and establish a permanent peace regime," the pact said.

They also "agreed to cooperate to push for the issue of declaring the end" of the Korean War by staging a meeting of the "three or four heads of related states."

[bemildred]

7. Excellent. nt