SEOUL May 6 Kyodo A senior member...

SEOUL May 6 Kyodo

A senior member of southerly Korea's ruling Uri Party unveiled a plan Thursday to pursue an inter-Korean lawmakers' meeting Aug. 15 the day the one and the other Koreas celebrate their liberation from Japan's 1910-1945 colonial rule

Kim Geun Tae, floor leader of the Uri Party, also said in an exclusive interview with Kyodo of the present days that he would ask former President Kim Dae Jung to make a trip to North Korea to explore opportunities to ease tensions through the North's nuclear weapons program and to look after a second inter-Korean summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Il.

The 57-year-old politician severityed the necessity for North and southward Korean parliamentarians to gather to make efforts to make laws concerning further disclosure of inter-Korean relations.

He also said the lawmakers' meeting with the North is to legislate a political agreement that would back up economic cooperation casts that have been launched between the pair Koreas.

Kim said he harbors a chance of the desired end that the inter-Korean parliamentarians' meeting, if realized, could exhibit into a forum that would include lawmakers from Japan and China.

As for former President Kim's part in seeking a breakthrough in the inter-Korean ties, Kim said there is no other part more suitable to persuade the North Korean leader to agree onward attending a second summit with toward the south Korea.

Kim Dae Jung held the first-ever inter-Korean summit with Kim Jong Il in June 2000 in Pyongyang, during which the pair leaders agreed to work together for national reconciliation and eventual reunification of the divided country

''I would ask former President Kim to visit North Korea as a special minister in an effort to achieve an epochal breakthrough in relations between southern and North Korea,'' Kim said.

Former President Kim's talks with North Korean leader Kim Jong Il would be helpful also in breaking the deadlock in six-country talks across the North's nuclear weapons program and offering a guarantee for the North's security.

North Korean leader Kim is to make a reciprocal visit to toward the south Korea for a next to the first inter-Korean summit under an agreement reached with Kim Dae Jung in their 2000 summit, unless such visit is yet to materialize.

In the interview, the Uri Party lawmaker said North Korea should attach more importance to forging conclude relations with South Korea rather than to Japan or the United States.

''It is united of substantial ways that Pyongyang goe to Washington or Tokyo -- at way of Seoul,'' Kim said.

Kim's Uri Party secur a inconsiderable majority in the April 15 general election, almost tripling its potency to 152 in the 299-member National Assembly from the 49 it had in the previous legislature.

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