Koreas Resume Talks As Seoul Sees North Korea Troop Movement

PYONGYANG, North Korea— Senior officials from North and South Korea on Sunday were in their second day of marathon talks meant to pull the rivals back from the brink, even amid reports of unusual North Korean troop and submarine movement that Seoul s...

South Korean marines patrol along on Yeonpyeong island, South Korea, Sunday, Aug. 23, 2015. Senior officials from North and South Korea resumed a second round of talks on Sunday that temporarily pushed aside vows of imminent war on the peninsula. South Korea's presidential office said the talks restarted in the border village of Panmunjom. The delegates failed to reach an agreement in Saturday's marathon talks that stretched into the early hours of Sunday, and it was still unclear whether diplomacy would defuse what has become the most serious confrontation in years. (Yun Tae-hyun/Yonhap via AP) KOREA OUT

PYONGYANG, North Korea— Senior officials from North and South Korea on Sunday were in their second day of marathon talks meant to pull the rivals back from the brink, even amid reports of unusual North Korean troop and submarine movement that Seoul said indicated continued battle preparation.

While it was not clear whether any progress was made during the first round of talks, which started Saturday evening and finished just before dawn Sunday, the second day of diplomacy, for the time being, pushed aside the heated warnings of imminent war.

These are the highest-level talks between the two Koreas in a year. And just the fact that senior officials from countries that have spent recent days vowing to destroy each other are sitting together at a table in Panmunjom, the border enclave where the 1953 armistice ending fighting in the Korean War, is something of a victory.

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