SEOUL, South Korea — As tens of thousands gathered Sunday to mourn the death of former South Korea President Kim Dae-Jung, who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his bid to reconcile relations between his nation and North Korea, Seoul’s conservative government took a page from his diplomatic playbook, meeting face to face with envoys from its communist counterpart.
In a rare half-hour sit-down, his first since taking office last year, President Lee Myung-Bak discussed growing tensions on the Korean peninsula with a high-level delegation from the North on hand to pay respects to Kim, who died Tuesday at 85 after a long bout with pneumonia.
Shortly before the state ceremony at the National Assembly on a humid afternoon, the delegation appeared at the Blue House with an undisclosed message from North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il, said Blue House spokesman Lee Dong-Kwan.
Seoul’s Chosun Ilbo and JoongAng Ilbo newspapers reported that the reclusive Kim had expressed his desire to hold a summit with Lee, citing unidentified officials. But Seoul’s presidential Blue House denied the reports.
A spokesman for Lee quoted him as saying during a photo session with Northern envoy Kim Ki-Nam that “there is nothing that cannot be solved if South and North sort out their problems through communication and sincerity.”
The meeting came amid a recent thaw in relations between the Koreas, started this month when former President Bill Clinton traveled to Pyongyang, the North Korean capital, and secured the release of two U.S. television journalists held there.
After that visit, which many said displayed Kim Jong-Il’s willingness to engage with the U.S. and South Korea, Pyongyang released a South Korean worker it had held for nearly 140 days. North Korea also has removed most of its travel restrictions enacted last year on South Korean businesses at a jointly run industrial park.
The usually bellicose North Korean state- run media were low-key Sunday in their reporting of the day’s events, saying that their delegation had “visited Seoul to mourn the death of ex-President Kim Dae-Jung.”
The Korean Central News Agency acknowledged that the envoys met with Lee, saying that “issues of developing the relations between the North and the South were discussed.”
A former secretary to the late South Korean leader called the meeting a fitting tribute to his efforts at North-South reconciliation.
“If there is a will left by Kim Dae-Jung to Kim Jong-Il and Lee Myung-Bak, it goes: Don’t confront with each other. Reconcile via communication,” said Chang Sung-Min.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
