SEOUL, South Korea (AP) - The two Koreas will hold their highest-level talks in years Wednesday in an effort to restore scrapped joint economic projects and ease animosity marked by recent threats of nuclear war. That in itself is progress, though there are already hints that disputes in their bloody history could thwart efforts to better ties.
Still, just setting up the two-day meeting in Seoul, through a 17-hour negotiating session that ended early Monday, required the kind of diplomatic resolve that has long been absent in inter-Korean relations.
The main topics will be stalled rapprochement projects left over from friendlier days, including the resumption of operations at a jointly run factory park just north of the border.
North Korea, however, is also pushing for something Seoul hasn't agreed to: A discussion Wednesday of how to jointly commemorate past inter-Korean statements, including the anniversary Saturday of a statement settled during a 2000 summit.
This matters to North Korea because the June 15 statement from the 2000 summit, along with another 2007 leaders' summit, include both important symbolic nods to future reconciliation and also economic cooperation agreements that would benefit the North financially.
Those commitments faded after Park's conservative predecessor, Lee Myung-bak, took office in 2008. His insistence that large-scale government aid be linked to North Korea making progress on past commitments to abandon its nuclear ambitions drew a furious reaction from Pyongyang. Relations deteriorated further in 2010 after a North Korean bombardment of a South Korean island killed four people, and the sinking of the South Korean warship Cheonan killed 46 sailors.
A Seoul-led international investigation blamed a North Korean torpedo for the Cheonan attack, and South Korea has demanded an apology from the North before it will allow any exchanges. Pyongyang denies any role in the sinking, and the two sides will presumably bring those irreconcilable positions with them Wednesday.
Since her presidential campaign, Park has mixed a tough line with policies of engagement, aid and reconciliation with the North - a recognition of the frustration many South Koreans felt about Lee's hard-line policies.