Some forty linguists and officials from the two Koreas have kicked off joint efforts to publish a common Korean dictionary for the first time in half a century.

A joint committee in charge of the project was launched in a ceremony at North Korea's scenic Mount Geumgang on Sunday. The committee adopted a joint statement on details of compiling the dictionary and setting dates for regular meetings.

Preparing Toward One Korea, a Seoul-based civic group that represents South Korea in the project, said that the work is apparently aimed at documenting all the dialects of the Korean language on the peninsula in the next five years. The group said the gap between South and North Korean language has grown since the two countries standardized the use of different dialects when the peninsula was divided five decades ago.

In a congratulatory address, Rep. Chang Young-dal of the ruling Uri Party stressed that the publication of a 'unified' Korean dictionary would lay a foundation for the unification of the Korean Peninsula.

Ko Un, a South Korean poet who chairs the joint committee, said that the release of the dictionary would also clear away the last vestiges of Japanese colonialism and heal the pain of national division.