The government has allowed South Korean scholars to meet with their North Korean counterparts for an inter-Korean project to publish a joint Korean dictionary.
 
In a Monday briefing, Unification Ministry deputy spokeswoman Park Soo-jin said the government gave its approval after the project organizers notified the ministry about contacting North Koreans related to the project. 
 
With the approval, a group of 32 South Korean lexicographers and officials will attend the inter-Korean meeting opening Tuesday in Shenyang, China.

At the meeting, the two Koreas will discuss the timetable and direction of the publication, and share progress made on each side during the suspended period of the joint project.
 
Spokeswoman Park noted Seoul has continued to allow strictly social and cultural exchanges with the North in the non-political sector. She said the inter-Korean meeting was approved considering the significance of the joint dictionary project in restoring the homogeneity of the Korean language.
 
The project to publish what's called the “Big Dictionary of the Korean People's Language” got off ground when an inter-Korean committee was launched in February 2006. 
 
But the project was halted when South Korea imposed sanctions on inter-Korean exchange, following the North's sinking of a South Korean Navy ship. The Committee members recently got in contact and agreed to resume the project.
 
Both Koreas speak the same language, but differences in daily use have widened over the years the two sides have been separated.