Seoul - North Korea accepted a proposal to meet Friday with the US-led UN Command on reducing tensions on the Korean Peninsula.

Pyongyang agreed Thursday to the proposal for the meeting of generals from both sides after consultations between officers of North Korea and the UN force at the inter-Korean border village of Panmunjom, the South Korean-based UN Command said.

Seoul  - Shares surged 3.3 per cen

Wellington  - New Zealand and South Korea will start negotiations on a free trade pact as soon as possible, leaders of the two countries announced Tuesday after a summit meeting in Auckland.

The announcement came following talks between New Zealand Prime Minister John Key and the South Korean President Lee Myung-Bak, who is on a two-day visit to the South Pacific nation.

"Our relationship with Korea is strong and vibrant, and we would like to further strengthen this relationship, building on extensive bilateral cooperation in recent years," Key said.

A joint statement said the leaders emphasised the importance of maintaining open markets and shared concerns for the deepening economic crisis.

Sana'a, Yemen  - The Yemeni coastguard thwarted a pirate attack on a South Korean cargo ship in the Gulf of Aden, killing one pirate on Monday, Yemen's Interior Ministry reported.

A coastguard unit in the southern Yemeni port of Aden answered a distress call from the Korean ship that came under attack about 40 miles off Aden, the ministry said in a statement.

Pirates were closing in on the ship pointing rocket-propelled grenade (RPG) launchers in an attempt to force it to stop as a dispatched coastguard gunboat reached the site, the ministry said.

"Coast guards exchanged fire with the Somali pirates and fatally shot one of them," it said, adding that the pirates fled the area and the ship was able to continue its journey.

Seoul - South Korea's industry output logged its sharpest drop on record, pushing South-East Asia's fourth largest economy further towards a deep recession.

Output in the mining and manufacturing sectors fell by 25.5 per cent year-on-year in January, after dropping 18.7 per cent in December, the statistics office in Seoul said. It was the sharpest drop since 1970, when such data was first compiled.

Seoul - High-ranking officials of the North Korean army and the United Nations Command (UNC) in South Korea met Monday as tension on the Korean peninsula mounted.

North Korea asked for the meeting, held at the heavily fortified border village Panmunjom, the US-led UNC said, making it the first meeting between the two sides in almost seven years.

Over the weekend, the communist country's state-controlled media accused US troops stationed in the South of "provocations" along the demilitarized puffer zone between the two Koreas.