Two Koreas to talk after tension

SEOUL, (AP):North and South Korea will meet in a village straddling their heavily armed border today for the first government-level talks on the peninsula in more than two years as they try to lower tension and restore stalled projects that once symbolised their rapprochement.

The North yesterday delivered its agreement to talk in Panmunjom through a Red Cross line restored a day earlier, Seoul's Unification Ministry said in a text message. Pyongyang had earlier favoured its border city of Kaesong, which contains the industrial park emptied in May after tensions peaked.

Representatives of the rival Koreas met on the peninsula in February 2011 and their nuclear envoys met in Beijing later that year, but government officials from both sides have not met since.

Today's meeting will be clearest sign of eased tensions since Pyongyang threatened to attack South Korea and the United States with nuclear missiles earlier this year, and the South made counter-threats.

It also comes as their top allies are meeting.

President Barack Obama opened a weekend summit Friday with Chinese President Xi Jinping in California to discuss several topics, including North Korea's nuclear programmes.