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SEOUL: South Korean President Roh Moo-Hyun is considering "walking across" the heavily-fortified border to North Korea for a summit early next month, a report said on Sunday.
Chosun Ilbo, the largest circulation daily in South Korea, said, however, the idea had sparked concern about the safety of the head of state.
Roh is to visit North Korea by car via the truce border village of Panmunjeon from October 2 to 4 for peace talks with the North's leader Kim Jong-Il – only the second inter-Korean summit in the six decades since the peninsula was divided.
Roh's predecessor, Kim Dae-Jung, travelled to the North by air for the first-ever peace summit with Kim in 2000.
"Using an overland route for this summit unlike the first one, we're considering showing the president walking across the border line, the symbol of the divided Korea," an unnamed government official told Chosun.
The idea, if realised, would allow Roh to drop off his car near the inter-Korean military demarcation line and walk across with his staff, the paper said.
But another unnamed government official told the newspaper: "Lots of hurdles, including safety concerns, still exist. It is one of many ideas floated around. Nothing has been decided yet."
Despite peace efforts in recent years, the two Koreas remain technically at war since the 1950s Korean conflict.
Seoul's Unification Minister Lee Jae-Joung, in charge of preparing the summit, told a briefing last week the two Koreas needed more talks to fix Roh's detailed itinerary.
- AFP/so
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