North and South Korea will hold a ceremony in late November or early December to break ground on road and railway connections over the inter-Korean border, the South's Unification Ministry said Monday.

The two Koreas will also conduct a joint field inspection for the envisioned connections before the ceremony, a joint statement released by the ministry said, following the day's high-level talks in the Demilitarized Zone dividing the two Koreas.

(South Korea's Cho Myoung Gyon, front left, shakes hands with North's Ri Son Gwon)
[Pool photo]

North and South Korea will also discuss late this month a proposed bid to co-host the 2032 Olympics and participating in the 2020 Tokyo Olympics together, according to the statement.

The talks at the border village of Panmunjeom were aimed at implementing agreements made at September's summit in Pyongyang between North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and South Korean President Moon Jae In.

At the talks, the South Korean delegation was led by Unification Minister Cho Myoung Gyon, with the North Korean delegation fronted by Ri Son Gwon, chairman of the Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of the Country.

During Monday's discussion, the two Koreas also agreed to hold inter-Korean Red Cross talks in November to resolve issues regarding families separated in the 1950-1953 Korean War and to hold working-level talks on a North Korean art troupe's performance in Seoul this month.

To ease military tensions, the two sides agreed to hold general-level military talks in the near future.

In a joint declaration adopted at the Sept. 19 summit in Pyongyang, the Koreas agreed to hold a ground-breaking ceremony by the year-end for such road and railway connections.

"We will try our best to yield good results to carry out the September Pyongyang Joint Declaration," Cho said in the morning before departing for Panmunjeom.

The declaration also set forth the staging of the performance by the Pyongyang Art Troupe in Seoul sometime this month.