A group of lawmakers submitted to the National Assembly a revision to the Inter-Korean Exchanges Law calling for eased restriction on contacts between South Koreans and overseas Koreans who are members of pro-North Korean organizations.

Lawmaker Im Jong-seok and 17 others say that the provision defining such members as North Korean citizens should be dropped. They cited the regulation that changed in 2005 requiring only a report after a South Korean national has contact with a North Korean, and not a prior government approval.

Im said that due to expanding exchanges, a hundred thousand people from the South visited the North last year with 27 hundred having met North Koreans.

He said that the "outdated law of the Cold War era" creates a strain on people seeking contact between the two Koreas.

The existing law on inter-Korean exchanges slaps a three million won fine on violators.

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