An intense war of nerves unfolded during the rare four-day cross-border talks, with South Korea pressuring the North to apologize for the recent set of North Korean provocations, while the other side tried to gloss over its responsibility, a senior Seoul official said Tuesday.

However, the two sides reached an agreement through their determination to defuse tensions, which sharply rose after the North forward-deployed a majority of its submarines and artillery assets and the South vowed stern retaliation.

“The North Korean side repeatedly said that they came all the way there to resolve pending issues. They showed their determination to do so,” the official at Seoul’s Unification Ministry, who was informed of the negotiation process, said on the customary condition of anonymity.

“The fact that Hwang Pyong-so, one of the top military officers, traveled all the way to the Peace House on the South Korean side of the border village of Panmunjeom also showed their seriousness to resolve the issues. It is rare for the top military official to come here in times of heightened military tensions.”

Hwang, the director of the North Korean military’s General Political Bureau, and Kim Yang-gon, a secretary of the North’s ruling Workers’ Party, represented the North Korean side during the talks. Their South Korean counterparts were Kim Kwan-jin, chief of Cheong Wa Dae’s National Security Office, and Unification Minister Hong Yong-pyo.

At one point during the negotiation, the air turned especially serious when Pyongyang tried to shift the focus to the future in its apparent attempt to avoid discussing its past provocations. This, in turn, struck the nerve of Kim, the former defense minister, the official said.

“Kim blurted out that our young soldiers with a bright future got injured in the detonation of land mines in the Demilitarized Zone. But the North reiterated that the two sides needed to look toward the future,” he said.

To counter the North’s denial of its responsibility for the Aug. 4 land mine attack, the South Korean side also reportedly presented evidence.

The toughest part of the negotiation was ensuring that the North would not stage future provocations, the official said, noting that getting the North to express “regret” over the land mine incident was less difficult.

Meanwhile, over the course of the lengthy talks, the two sides kept their distance, including by having meals separately. The North Korean officials traveled back to their building a few minutes away while the South Korean officials dined at the Peace House.

By Song Sang-ho  (sshluck@heraldcorp.com)