South Korea's foreign ministry said Seoul and Beijing are consulting on creating a detailed schedule of a ministerial meeting, in response to reports that foreign minister Cho Tae-yul was seeking to visit China ahead of a trilateral summit involving Japan expected in late May.

In a statement on Sunday, the ministry said the two sides have been closely communicating based on the shared view of the importance of high-level exchanges.

In early February, Wang Yi, China's foreign minister and head of the Chinese Communist Party's Office of the Central Commission for Foreign Affairs, had invited Cho to Beijing, to which the South Korean minister suggested that they consult through diplomatic channels.

Should Cho make the trip to China for talks with his counterpart, it would be the first face-to-face meeting between the two sides' top diplomats since a three-way ministerial gathering also involving Japan last November.

The Cho-Wang meeting, if held, would be followed by a trilateral summit in Seoul, with foreign media outlets reporting that talks are under way for the meeting to take place between May 26 and 27.