정부 "北주민 대상 인도적 식량지원 추진해 나갈 것... 규모•시기•방식 검토"

South Korea says it plans to offer humanitarian food assistance to North Korea.
Seoul will begin reviewing the specifics of when and how and make an announcement once decisions are made.
Arirang's unification ministry correspondent Oh Jung-hee has our top story.
South Korea officially announced a plan Wednesday to provide food assistance to North Korea,... and said related procedures will begin soon.
"We are the same people as the North Koreans, so we have humanitarian concerns about the grave food situation in the North recently announced by international organizations. South Korea will proceed with giving humanitarian food aid to the North through close coordination with the international community."
This comes after South Korean President Moon Jae-in and U.S. President Donald Trump, in their phone call Tuesday night, agreed on the need to send the North food.
The UN's food agencies had announced last week... that more than 10 million people in the North or about 40 percent of the population are suffering from a food shortage... and that Pyeongyang's crop production is at its lowest in ten years.
Seoul says it will begin reviewing the specifics of how the assistance should be given.
"Related organizations will first need to discuss the matters of when, how, and how much."
In 2017, South Korea had decided to offer the North humanitarian aid worth 8 million U.S. dollars through UNICEF and the WFP.
That assistance which had to be given by 2018 was never sent... and the plan was scrapped.
So things are now back to square one.
Seoul has to determine once again on how much worth of aid it will give the North.
The Blue House says it's now starting to review things.
And that includes whether South Korea will give the assistance directly to the North... or through UN agencies.
Oh Jung-hee, Arirang News.