Officials from North and South Korea have begun their first detailed talks for nearly two years on how to re-establish cross-border road and rail links.

The discussions, being held in the South Korean capital Seoul, are a follow-up to a ministerial meeting between the two sides earlier this month.

North and South Korea must open a wide road for prosperity and unification by driving a train of co-operation through a barrier of division

Pak Chang-ryon North Korea's chief delegate

The talks are expected to focus largely on practical issues such as how safely to cross the Demilitarised Zone (DMZ) dividing the two states - one of the most heavily fortified borders in the world.

The meeting is the latest step in a diplomatic charm offensive by the Stalinist North, which has recent turned to the outside world, primarily the United States and South Korea, for much needed help.

Easing shortages

North Korea's chief delegate, Pak Chang-ryon, said the re-opening of crucial transport routes was essential to ease food and energy shortages.

"North and South Korea must open a wide road for prosperity and unification by driving a train of co-operation through a barrier of division," he told French news agency AFP.

The Stalinist North have been reaching out to their neighbours

Correspondents say there may be discussion of the final destination of the cross-border rail link.

South Korea favours a route which would lead into China, while officials from the North appear to favour connecting directly into the Russian Far East.

Russian President Vladimir Putin pressed North Korea last week to build a new train line across the Korean peninsula, bypassing China, by extending Russia's trans-Siberian railway.

The new Asia-Europe freight link would be expected to help revitalise Russia's Far East.

Commitment needed

The ministerial meetings two weeks ago failed to reach a consensus over building a railway through the DMZ that bisects the Korean peninsula.

This time, talks are expected to focus on bringing military units together to complete the railroad safely, avoiding the many mines and razor wire strewn across the length of the DMZ, South Korean officials say.

South Korea has also said it will send rice to its impoverished neighbour, but the government has stressed that in turn it expects North Korea to be co-operative.

Analysts say that the rice aid could be used as leverage to persuade the North to make a firm commitment regarding the railway.

"Unless the talks produce any tangible progress on railway and road connections, the South would not provide rice to the North," said Korea Development Institute analyst Shin Ji-ho.

"Most of all, North Korea wants rice shipments from South Korea at a time when it is trying to reform its economic system."

Trade improvements

Relinking the railway would not only ease tension between the two countries, analysts say, but would also aid industrialisation and improve international trade in the North.

Under the 2000 agreement between North and South, the rail line will eventually connect Seoul with the North Korean capital Pyongyang.

South Korea has nearly finished its side, but the North has done little.

The two Koreas remain technically at war as they never signed a peace treaty when hostilities ended in 1953.