Koreas start journey for railway reconnection

SEOUL: A South Korean train crossed into North Korea on Friday for the first time in a decade, packed with engineers on a mission to upgrade the North's dilapidated rail tracks and create a linked, cross-border network.

Connecting up the railway systems was one of the agreements made earlier this year in a key meeting between North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and the South´s President Moon Jae-in.

It marked the first time in a decade that a train from the South entered North Korea. TV footage on Friday showed a red, white and blue train -- displaying a banner reading "Iron Horse is now running toward the era of peace and prosperity" -- pull away from the South´s Dorasan station, the nearest terminal from the western part of the inter-Korean border.

"This signals the start of co-prosperity of the North and the South by reconnecting railways," Transport Minister Kim Hyun-mee said. She added the railway reconnection would help expand the country´s "economic territory" to Eurasia by land, as the division of the Korean peninsula has left South Korea geopolitically cut off from the continent for many decades.

The six-carriage train is transporting 28 South Koreans including railway engineers and other personnel, and carrying 55 tonnes of fuel and an electricity generator.

There is a passenger coach, a sleeping coach, an office coach and a wagon loaded with water for showers and laundry.

When it arrives at Panmun Station -- the first North Korean terminal across the border -- the six carriages will be linked up to a North Korean train, and the South Korean locomotive will return home.