North Korea agreed on Tuesday to a third round of talks with South Korea aimed at resolving a long-running row over a shuttered joint tourist resort in the North, Reuters reported. A rush of diplomatic contacts between the two Koreas and the United States, plus a shipment of food aid from the South on Tuesday, raised hopes for a resumption of long-delayed aid-for-denuclearisation talks. Seoul had proposed a new round of dialogue for Friday to discuss Pyongyang's threat to strip a South Korean company of its assets at the resort, and added it was also willing to discuss a resumption of tourism links. The North said in a letter to the unification ministry, the office that deals with inter-Korean affairs in Seoul, that it agreed to hold working-level talks on the condition that South Korea brings private businessmen. -- SPA
