Unification Minister Lee Jae-joung said Thursday that South Korea will accept North Korea’s proposal to hold general-level military talks next week.

A day after Pyongyang proposed the talks, the minister confirmed that military officials from the two Koreas will meet for three days beginning Tuesday.

Seoul is expected to confirm with Pyongyang on Friday.

Lee said that the main purpose of the general-level talks is to discuss military safety guarantees for cross-border railway test runs later this month.

But he added that ways to ease military tensions on the Korean Peninsula could be discussed as the talks are the first military contacts since Pyongyang’s nuclear test last October.