North Korea to Reopen Vital Inter-Korean Hotline

In a welcome step to ease the tension in the Korean peninsula, North Korea said it would restart a vital inter-Korean hotline, despite sabre-rattling by US President Donald Trump. The move, raising the hopes of ending the diplomatic impasse, comes after leader Kim Jong-un extended an overture to Seoul in his New Year's Day message.

The North will open the dialogue channel at the shared border village of Panmunjom at 3 p.m., Yonhap News Agency quoted Pyongyang state-media as saying.

"By upholding a decision by the leadership, we will make close contact with South Korea in a sincere and faithful manner," said Ri Son-gwon, the head of North Korea's agency handling inter-Korean affairs. "We will discuss working-level issues over our potential dispatch of the delegation."

But he did not specify whether the country would accept Seoul's offer for high-level talks slated for January 9. South Korea had suggested high-level talks at Panmunjom, an area of the demilitarised zone. The last high-level talk was held in December 2015.

The announcement comes a day after Seoul proposed high-level inter-Korean talks to discuss North Korea's possible participation in the PyeongChang Winter Olympics and ways to improve ties.

On New Year's Day, Kim said North Korea was willing to send a delegation to the Olympics in South Korea and is open to inter-Korean talks over the matter.

Pyongyang cut off two inter-Korean communication channels -- a hotline installed at the liaison office at the truce village and a military channel -- in February 2016 in protest of Seoul's shutdown of a joint industrial complex.

Kim "highly appreciated and welcomed" South Korean President Moon Jae-in's support of his peace offer, Ri said.

"The leader stressed that whether inter-Korean ties can be improved totally depends on North and South Korea," he said.

South Korea's Unification Ministry welcomed the North's restoration of the cross-border channel.

"We will consult with North Korea over working-level issues in connection to our dialogue offer through the hotline," the ministry said.

Meanwhile, Trump intensified his twitter war against North Korea, claiming that ‘his nuclear button is much bigger and powerful’. His lieutenant and US envoy to UN, Nikki Haley, questioned the wisdom of an inter-Korean dialogue without a North Korean commitment to abandon its nuclear weapons programme.

“We consider this to be a very reckless regime. We don’t think we need a Band-Aid and we don’t think we need to smile and take a picture,” Haley said. “We think we need to have them stop nuclear weapons and they need to stop it now. We will never accept a nuclear North Korea.”

(with inputs from IANS)