Unification Minister Lee In-young called Wednesday for China to play a “constructive” role in the resumption of inter-Korean dialogue and to help bring permanent peace and stability to the Korean Peninsula.

Lee made the remark during his first meeting with Chinese Ambassador to Seoul Xing Haiming after his inauguration last month, underlining the need for the two countries to cooperate with North Korea in tackling the coronavirus pandemic.

“Now, inter-Korean relations have been in a stalemate for quite a long time but we believe that under any circumstances dialogue should continue and therefore our government wants to make much efforts to put inter-Korean dialogue back on track,” Lee said at the start of the meeting.

"The Chinese government has expressed its support for dialogue between the South and the North and between the North and the United States. Our government highly appraises the Chinese government‘s efforts and expects it to continue to cooperate going forward,” he added.

Inter-Korean relations have been stalled since the no-deal nuclear summit between the North and the US early last year. The ties got worse recently when North Korea blew up a joint liaison office in its border town of Kaesong in anger over anti-Pyongyang leaflets flown from the South.(Yonhap)