The New Nation - Internet Edition

AFP, Seoul

South Korea said Friday the communist North was commited to peace and promised that the private sector will largely pay for an estimated 11 billion dollars in new projects agreed at a landmark summit

President Roh Moo-Hyun, only the second South Korean leader to visit Pyongyang, pledged with North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il to work for a peace treaty to close the last Cold War frontier after six decades of division.

The summit declaration also called for a series of joint economic projects including a special economic zone around the North's western port of Haeju, construction of joint shipyards and tours to the North's scenic Mount Paekdu.

The deals surprised South Korean analysts and media, who had low expectations of the summit, although Roh's conservative critics charged that he failed to press the North on its nuclear weapons and human rights record.

Unification Minister Lee Jae-Joung said the two countries had started "a new framework to bring about permanent peace on the Korean peninsula and advance their relations, including economic cooperation and exchanges." "This summit has opened a new chapter for peace," Lee told a news conference. The leaders' declaration called for a summit with the United States and China to permanently end the 1950-53 Korean War, which halted with only an armistice.

Foreign Minister Song Min-Soon pledged that work to draft a peace treaty would take place "in line with denuclearisation" -- not separately from it