South Korea declines Olympic talks with North

Press, 25 September 1987, Page 34

South Korea declines Olympic talks with North

S ou j|] Korea has rejected North Korea’s invitation to talk about sharing the 1988 Seoul Olympic Games.

Seoul urged Pyongyang to accept a compromise already laboriously hammered out by the International Olympic Committee (1.0. C. South Korean Olympic Committee president Kim Chong-ha, in a letter to his Northern counterpart, Kim Yu-sun, said the talks would only cause confusion by complicating the negotiations between the two Koreas presided over by the 1.0. C. in Lausanne, Switzerland.

The letter was delivered to the communist North at the Panmunjom border armistice village, a South Korean spokesman said.

The 1.0. C., which has awarded the 1988 Games to Seoul, has held four rounds of talks with North and South Korea since 1985 to avert a possible

Pyongyang-led communist boycott. “As it has been often pointed out by the 1.0. C., the fifth round of SouthNorth Korean sports talks will soon be convened and progress will be made in the discussion of issues only if your side accepts the 1.0.C.’s adjusted proposal,” the South Korean committee chief said in the letter, replying to an earlier letter from Kim Yu-sun. Seoul officials say any talks about the Olympics should involve the 1.0. C. and say no more talks are necessary unless Pyongyang accepts the 1.0.C.’s July take-it-or-leave-it offer. With Seoul’s agreement, this offered the North the archery, table tennis, women’s volleyball, men’s 100 km cycle road race and one of four soccer

preliminary group competitions. North Korea responded last month with new proposals calling for five full events, including the soccer tournament, and one partial event. An 1.0. C. spokeswoman said in Lausanne last month the committee had rejected a North Korean request for fresh talks with South Korea on Pyongyang’s latest demands. Kim Chong-ha, noting that invitations were sent out on September 17 to a record 167 countries to take part in the Seoul games, urged Pyongyang to accept the 1.0. C. offer. He called on the North to take part in “this historical international sporting event to be held in our country for the first time, thereby not only

promoting world peace, goodwill and friendship but also providing a great turning point for national reconciliation and unity

The 1.0. C. president, Juan Antonio Samaranch, said last week he would meet Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev to try to avoid a Communist boycott of the Games, set to start on September 17. Speaking after a ceremony in Lausanne to mark the mailing of Olympic invitations, Mr Samaranch said he hoped to see Mr Gorbachev before the January 17 deadline for replies. The Soviet Union, China and other Communist countries have backed Pyongyang’s demands to share the Games but have not yet formally declared support for its boycott call.