By Alex Jensen
SEOUL
The two Koreas held secretive military talks at their closely guarded border Wednesday, according to reports out of Seoul after recent exchanges of fire between the two sides.
"Inter-Korean general-level military talks got underway from 10 a.m. at the truce village of Panmunjom," a parliamentary source revealed via local news agency Yonhap.
He added that "the North does not want to make it public."
There has been no official confirmation of the meeting from either side. Such high-level inter-Korean military talks have not been seen in seven years, although earlier this month Pyongyang did send its effective second-in-command, Hwang Pyong-so, to the South for unanticipated talks with leading Seoul officials.
It also marked the first time since 2007 – when the last inter-Korean summit was held - of a serving premier from the South meeting with high-ranking North Korean officials.
But the sudden warming of bilateral ties appeared to cool when the Koreas twice exchanged fire last week - first when a North Korean naval vessel crossed their maritime border and again after civic activists in the South flew anti-Pyongyang leaflets to the North over land in air balloons.
Wednesday's talks were reportedly aimed at relieving "tensions that have been heightened recently," according to a military source also quoted by Yonhap.
The two sides remain technically at war as they never signed a peace treaty at the end of the 1950-53 Korean War.
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