South Korean President Moon Jae-In said Wednesday he would be willing to sit down with the North's leader Kim Jong Un, as the international community welcomed an agreement for Pyongyang to send its athletes to the Winter Olympics in the South.

The Games in Pyeongchang next month have long been overshadowed by geopolitical tensions, with the North launching missiles capable of reaching the U.S. mainland in recent months and detonating by far its most powerful nuclear device to date.

But Pyongyang — which boycotted the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul — on Tuesday agreed to send athletes and officials to the event as North and South held their first formal talks for two years at Panmunjom in the Demilitarized Zone.

"It is only the beginning," Moon told a press conference. "Yesterday was the first step and I think we had a good start."

"Bringing North Korea to talks for denuclearization is the next step we must take."

He was willing to hold a summit "at any time," he said, as long as it was "under the right conditions."

"But it cannot be a meeting for meeting's sake. To hold a summit, the right conditions must be created and certain outcomes must be guaranteed."

Moon has long supported engagement with the North to bring it to the negotiating table over banned weapons programs that have alarmed the U.S. and the global community, and seen Pyongyang subjected to multiple sets of United Nations sanctions.

But the U.S. has said the regime must stop nuclear tests if negotiations with Washington are to take place.

"We have no difference in opinion with the U.S.," Moon insisted, saying they shared an understanding about security, were working together and were both threatened by the North's nuclear weapons and missiles.

But he stressed that the aim of sanctions was to bring North Korea to talks, and "stronger sanctions and pressures could further heighten tensions and lead to accidental armed conflicts."

"But thankfully, North Korea came to dialogue before tensions were heightened further," he said.

Currently, Seoul has no plans to ease its unilateral sanctions, Moon said.

U.S. President Donald Trump has a much closer relationship with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe than he does with Moon, and has claimed credit for the North-South talks.

"If I weren't involved, they wouldn't be talking about the Olympics right now, they'd be doing no talking," Trump said during the weekend.

Moon thanked him for his efforts Wednesday. "I think President Trump's role in the realization of inter-Korean talks was very big," he said. "I would like to express my gratitude."

Maximum pressure

The U.S. cautiously welcomed the talks but warned that the North's attendance at the Games should not undermine international efforts to isolate Kim's regime.

Trump and Moon had already agreed "to continue the campaign of maximum pressure on North Korea toward the goal of complete and verifiable denuclearization," the State Department said.

China — the North's major diplomatic backer and trade partner — and Russia, with which it also has strong ties, both welcomed the inter-Korean talks.

And Japan's top government spokesman Yoshihide Suga Tokyo "highly valued" Pyongyang's expressed willingness to participate in the Olympics.

"But there is no change in our policy of exerting the maximum level of pressure on North Korea until they change their policy, in close cooperation with the U.S., South Korea, and also involving China and Russia," he added.

International Olympic Committee president Thomas Bach said the agreement was a "great step forward in the Olympic spirit."

South Korean Prime Minister Lee Nak-Yon said the North was expected to send "a massive delegation of between 400-500 people" to Pyeongchang.

"Just as the 1988 Olympics contributed to dismantling the Cold War, we earnestly hope that the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics will improve the current state of the Korean Peninsula," he said, and "contribute to world peace by reducing security risks."

North Korea stayed away from that year's Games in Seoul, but Soviet bloc states and China took part despite the absence of diplomatic ties with the South.

Source: AFP