Seoul - South Korean President Lee Myung Bak called a meeting Monday of the members of his cabinet responsible for security, a day before the first talks between North and South Korea in more than a year.

The focus of the meeting was the inter-Korean discussions planned for Tuesday in North Korea and security issues, the Yonhap News Agency reported, citing a government official in Seoul.

It remained unclear what North Korea wants to discuss at the meeting it proposed but the discussions were likely not to be "too pleasant," an official at the presidential office told Yonhap.

"We are preparing for every possible scenario," the official was quoted as saying.

North Korea proposed the talks Saturday, saying it had an "important message" for its neighbour about their jointly operated industrial park at Kaesong, a North Korean city near the inter-Korean border.

The talks would be the first government-level discussions held with the North by Lee's government, which took office in February 2008.

There have been talks in that time between the two nations' militaries, however, and in those discussions in October, North Korea threatened to close the park, which is one of the most visible signs of the reconciliation agreements signed between the two neighbours during the era of South Korea's "Sunshine Policy" with the North.

North Korea's military made the threat because of its objections to South Korean activists dropping propaganda leaflets in its territory.

But the latest drop by balloons sent over the inter-Korean border was made a day after North Korea's internationally condemned April 5 rocket launch.

North Korea said the launch was for a communications satellite, but other countries accused it of testing a long-range missile.

Relations between the two Koreas have worsened considerably since Lee took office. The conservative has taken a harder line against South Korea's totalitarian neighbour than his liberal predecessors, who implemented the Sunshine Policy and signed the reconciliation pacts with Pyongyang.

The Kaesong industrial park allows South Korean firms to set up manufacturing facilities there and provide jobs for North Koreans. (dpa)