South Korea has accepted a North Korean proposal for high-level inter-Korean military talks.

The Unification Ministry in Seoul says North Korean People’s Armed Forces Minister Kim Yong-chun proposed that the two sides hold a high-level military meeting to discuss "pending military issues."

In a message sent to South Korean Defense Minister Kim Kwan-jin on Thursday morning, the North Korean defense chief proposed talks on the alleviation of military tensions on the Korean Peninsula. The North also proposed discussions on the North's shelling of South Korea's Yeonpyeong Island and the sinking of the “Cheonan” naval vessel.

A South Korean Defense Ministry official said earlier that the North most likely wants to hold a meeting between the defense ministers of the two Koreas.

A Unification Ministry official says that at the inter-Korean military talks, the South will demand that the North take responsible measures for the provocations as well as state a guarantee against a recurrence of similar incidents.

South Korea also accepted the North's proposal for holding working-level preparatory talks ahead of the senior-level military talks while at the same time deciding to propose holding separate high-level government officials' talks to discuss the North's denuclearization.

The defense ministers of the two Koreas held their first meeting in September 2000 on South Korea's Jeju Island. A second round of the South-North defense ministers' talks was held in November 2007 in Pyongyang.