"The government decided to allow the general public access to North Korea's TV broadcasts via satellite," a South Korean Unification Ministry spokesman told AFP.

He explained that the step was a part of South Korea's policy of engagement and reconciliation with North Korea, and also reflected a new confidence here that the North's propaganda can no longer undermine South Korea's ideology.

"It is also aimed at helping guide North Korea towards openness and change," another ministry official said, adding it paved the way for Seoul to make the same demand for Pyongyang in the future.

The South Korean media, including broadcasting companies, would be allowed to receive and use the North's TV broadcasts directly, said the ministry in a statement.

"The general public are also permitted to watch the (North's) broadcasts" at state-run facilities with proper equipment to receive satellite broadcasts, it said.

"From now on, the government will continue to push for the gradual disclosure of more information on North Korea to help our people understand it better."

Despite the progressive step, howver, Seoul's draconian national security law, which bans the recording and spreading of the North's TV broadcasts for anti-state purposes, will remain in force.

"But no legal regulations will be imposed on individuals and organizations just watching the broadcasts," an official said.

The move to relax controls on the media, seen as conciliatory towards North Korea, came 10 days after Pyongyang officially launched its seven-hour daily satellite television broadcasts.

The Stalinist North broadcast and propaganda media have been strictly banned here for decades as the rival Koreas remain polarised on opposite sides of the world's last Cold War frontier.

Seoul's lifting of the ban had been delayed due to fears that North Korea would try to use the new broadcasts for political propaganda focusing on criticism of capitalist South Korea's system.

The Korean peninsula was divided in 1945, and since the 1950-53 Korean War which ended without any peace agreement being signed, Seoul and Pyongyang have remained technically at war.

But since taking office in early 1998, South Korean President Kim Dae-Jung has sought a reconciliatory policy, known here as the "sunshine policy," aime at easing rivalries and tensions with the North.

Officials here said the South's allowance of public access to North Korean media conformed with Kim's policy of reaching out to the isolated country.

Observers, however, admit it was in any case technically impossible to prevent South Koreans who possess individual satellite dishes and converters from receiving the North's broadcasts.

Pyongyang said its Korean Central TV is broadcast via a Thai satellite from 4:30 p.m. to 11:30 p.m. daily.

Meanwhile, Seoul said on Thursday that it would take countermeasures against South Koreans' unauthorized contacts with North Koreans through a newly-opened Pyongyang website.

In time with its official start of satellite broadcasting, the North opened its official Web site, "Infobank," October 10.

Under the South's inter-Korean Exchange and Cooperation Law, South Koreans are allowed to browse through North Korean Web sites but banned from exchanging E-mails or joining North Korean groups.

Copyright 1999 AFP. All rights reserved. The material on this page is provided by AFP and may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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