S Korea's unification minister to pay first U.S. visit

South Korea's Unification Minister Yu Woo-ik will leave for the United States on Wednesday for a six- day visit involving meetings with U.S. officials, the ministry, overseeing relations with the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), said Monday. In his first U.S. tour since taking office last month, Yu is expected to meet with key U.S. officials including Deputy Secretary of State William Burns and Senator Joe Lieberman, chairman of the Senate Homeland Security Committee, according to the ministry. Yu is also scheduled to visit the Council on Foreign Relations, a nonpartisan think tank in Washington, to meet with experts to discuss South Korea's DPRK policy. The minister will then travel to New York to sit down with U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to discuss inter-Korean relations and humanitarian issues, according to the ministry. Yu, a dovish former ambassador to China, replaced his hard-line predecessor Hyun In-taek in a sign Seoul is seeking more dialogue with Pyongyang. "The visit is aimed at increasing Washington's understanding of unification and other inter-Korean issues and enhancing mutual cooperation in terms of policy coordination," Choi Bo-sun, spokesman for the unification ministry, said.