North finalizes tourist zone

After two years of delay, North Korea has finalized the boundaries of a special tourist zone at Mount Geumgang, an official of Hyundai Asan Corp. said yesterday. The South Korean company is the operator of a tour program to the scenic resort.
The designation of the mountain on the peninsula’s east coast as a special tourist zone was first agreed upon by the Hyundai Group’s late honorary chairman, Chung Ju-yung, and North Korean leader Kim Jong-il in June 2000. Pyeongyang enacted laws governing the zone last October, but has not made an official announcement about which areas the zone would include.
“North Korea in June decided that about 10 million pyeong (8,169 acres) of the mountain area will be the special tourist zone,” the Hyundai Asan official said.
The zone will include a site where Hyundai Asan plans to develop, and two villages in Goseong and Yangji. Jopo village, the prospective site of a permanent meeting station for families in the two Koreas that were separated by the Korean War, will also fall within the zone’s boundaries.
“North Korea is now mulling over when to make an announcement,” the Hyundai official said. “One possibility is to announce the zone at the same time that it announces the specific regulations that will govern the area.”
Unification Minister Jeong Se-hyun told the National Assembly’s unification and foreign affairs committee on Tuesday that the North had a clear intention of continuing with the Mount Geumgang tour program, citing the decision on the tourist zone’s boundaries.
He was seeking approval for the government to use inter-Korean cooperation funds to aid the money-losing tour program. The request was turned down, but the lawmakers allowed the government to spend 90 billion won ($81 million) of the fund to support cross-border railroad construction.

by Jeong Yong-soo