S.Korea, Japan to hold first joint security talks of diplomats, defence officials in 5 yrs

Seoul, April 14 Diplomats and defence officials from South Korea and Japan will hold joint talks next week for the first time in five years, Seoul's defence ministry said on Friday.

The director-general-level policy consultation meeting, which will take place Monday in Seoul, comes after South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida agreed to mend ties soured by historical disputes and step up security cooperation during a summit last month, Yonhap News Agency reported.

South Korea will be represented by Seo Min-jung, director-general for Asia and Pacific affairs at the foreign ministry, and Woo Kyung-seok, deputy director-general for international policy at the defense ministry.

Their Japanese counterparts are Takehiro Funakoshi, director-general of Asian and Oceanian affairs, and Atsushi Ando, deputy director-general of the Defense Policy Bureau.

During the session, the two sides will discuss common interest issues, including the security situation in Northeast Asia and on the Korean Peninsula, their respective defence and security policies, and the direction for bilateral security cooperation, it said.

The two countries' leaders agreed in a summit in Tokyo last month to resume various government dialogue channels that had been suspended amid strained ties due to historical disputes stemming from Japan's colonisation of the Korean Peninsula from 1910-45.

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