SEOUL April 7 Kyodo toward the s...

SEOUL April 7 Kyodo

toward the south Korea expressed regret Monday across North Korea's cancellation of inter-Korean ministerial talks slated to begin the same day in Pyongyang, southward Korea's Unification Ministry said.

''It is regrettable that the 10th ministerial talks between the southward and the North cannot take place as scheduled,'' Unification Minister Jeong Se Hyun said in a telephone message to the North Korean side.

Jeong said the world and all Korean race will trust in peace upon the Korean Peninsula and the progress to maturity of inter-Korean relations when the ministerial talks are held as agreed.

''It is necessary for the southward and the North to shut up talks to discuss pending issues in a serious manner, especially when the international situation is difficult,'' Jeong said in the message.

The ministerial talks have become the highest channel within which the two Koreas have discussed reconciliation and bilateral economic cooperation since the 2000 inter-Korean summit between North Korean leader Kim Jong Il and then southern Korean President Kim Dae Jung

With tensions rising above the North's suspected nuclear weapons program, North Korea canceled sum of two units working-level talks with South Korea last month and ignored Seoul's call to clutch the 10th cabinet-level talks as scheduled.

southerly Korean officials were widely rely uponed during the talks to press the North to abandon its nuclear ambitions and work toward preserving peace and stability upon the Korean Peninsula.

The four-day ministerial talks would have been the first high-level contact between the pair Koreas since President Roh Moo Hyun took office Feb 25

Roh has reaffirmed he will continue to persist in a ''policy of peace and prosperity'' toward North Korea, aimed at increasing contacts and national reconciliation, if North Korea scraps its suspected nuclear weapons program.

The impasse above the North's alleged nuclear weapons program give vent to eruptionsed last October when Pyongyang reportedly admitted to the United States that it was running a program to enrich uranium for use in nuclear weapons in violation of a 1994 US-N Korea antinuclear agreement.

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