North Korea proposed Thursday that the two Koreas hold a joint unification festival to mark the sixth anniversary of the landmark June 15 summit between their leaders in 2000.

The North's Korean Central Broadcasting Station cited Yang Hyong-sop, vice-president of the presidium of the Supreme People's Assembly, as making the overture during a policy meeting.

Yang reportedly stressed that more efforts must ensure that expanding inter-Korean ties would not regress to the state they were in before the June summit.

Meanwhile Choe Young-gun, the head of Pyongyang's inter-Korean economic cooperation committee, called for expanded business endeavors this year.

Six years ago, then-South Korean president Kim Dae-jung held a groundbreaking summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong-il in Pyongyang, which led to boosted cross-border exchanges.