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Pyongyang to sync time with Seoul as Korean Peninsula heads toward peace

Just Earth News | @justearthnews | 30 Apr 2018

Pyongyang to sync time with Seoul as Korean Peninsula heads toward peace


Pyongyang/Seoul: The speakers at the border blaring propaganda and pieces critical of the neighbour had earlier been turned off before the historic meeting between the respective leaders of North and South Korea.

During the meeting, the two leaders, Kim Jong-un and Moon Jae-in of North and South Korea respectively, had announced to formally end a 65-year-old Korean war this year with the signing of a peace treaty. 

Days after the successful meeting, Pyongyang, who maintains a 30-minute time gap with Seoul, has announced to sync its time with the latter.

According to North Korean state news agency KCNA, the Presidium of the Supreme People's Assembly, North Korea's parliament, has decided to adopt a decree on synchronizing the country with Seoul's time zone starting this Saturday.

It quoted Kim as saying, "Noting that it was a painful wrench to see two clocks indicating Pyongyang and Seoul times hanging on a wall of the summit venue, he proposed unifying the times of the north and the south before doing anything else."

The North Korean leader has said that since it was the North who changed the time, they will change it.

Baik Tae-hyun, spokesman at Seoul's unification ministry, told media, "The move seems to indicate Chairman Kim's active willingness for improving inter-Korean relations and seeking harmony with the international community. It also shows the country's resolve to implement inter-Korean agreements at a fast pace."

Talks between North Korea's Kim Jong-un and South Korea's Moon Jae-in took place in the border peace village in Panmunjom on Friday.

This was the first such high level meeting between the two neighbours in a decade.

Prior to the latest talks, the last North-South dialogue had taken place in 2007 in Pyongyang.

During the meeting, the two leaders announced to formally end a 65-year-old Korean war this year with the signing of a peace treaty.

According to media reports, a document, called the “Panmunjom Declaration for Peace, Prosperity and Unification on the Korean Peninsula,” said: “The two leaders solemnly declare ... that there will be no more war on the Korean Peninsula and a new era of peace has begun.”

North Korea has also announced that it will lay down nuclear tests and weapons for now, as Kim is presently rallying for peace in the Korean Peninsula.

According to NK News, during his meeting with Moon, while sharing a stroll, Kim also spoke about defectors.

"We should value this opportunity so that the wound between the two Koreas can be healed. The borderline is not high, it will be eventually erased if a large number of people pass over," Kim told Moon.

 

Image: korea.net