In this July 27 photo, a South Korean service member uses the inter-Korean western military communication line. Yonhap
North Korea answered South Korea's calls via a radio hotline on Tuesday for the first time since all fixed communication lines between the two sides were restored last week, officials said.
Last week, South and North Korea reopened all cross-border communication lines, including military hotlines, 13 months after Pyongyang cut them off in protest over anti-regime propaganda leaflets flying in from the South.
Though both of the two direct military communication lines ― the western and eastern hotlines ― operated normally, Pyongyang had not answered the South's calls via ship-to-ship radio links that use the global merchant marine communication, officials said.
"This morning, we again called the North at the designated time via the international network hotline, and got an answer from the North," a ministry official said.