South Korea to share expenses

South Korea to share expenses

SEOUL (Reuter): South Korea is expected to pay part of the expenses of North Korean athletes participating in the Atlanta Olympic Games, domestic media reported yesterday.

"We have decided to pay part of North Korean expenses on a humanitarian basis," a government official was quoted by the Chosun Ilbo daily as saying.

The aid, estimated at several hundred thousand U.S. dollars, would be made through the Atlanta Olympic organizing committee, the paper reported.

The two countries are technically still at war since an armistice in July 1953 ended the Korean War. Seoul has joined the United States and Japan in pledging food aid to help ease food shortages in the isolated Stalinist state.