ROK still committed to dialogue with DPRK: minister

SEOUL - A minister of the Republic of Korea in charge of inter-Korean affairs said Monday that the country was still committed to dialogue with the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.

"We remain firmly committed to addressing all inter-Korean issues through dialogue," ROK Unification Minister Kwon Young-se told a press conference with foreign correspondents in Seoul.

"In that sense, our government will engage in consistent efforts to achieve change in the inter-Korean relations, which are in a stalemate, through the embracing of the path of dialogue," said Kwon.

ROK President Yoon Suk-yeol, who was inaugurated on May 10, said at his inaugural ceremony that if the DPRK stops nuclear development and genuinely embarks on denuclearization, his government will be prepared to work with the international community to present an "audacious plan" that can improve the DPRK's economy.

The minister said ROK wished to realize peaceful unification on the Korean Peninsula through the peninsula's denuclearization and the normalized relations between the two Koreas.