Pyongyang criticised over killing

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Seoul has complained that North Korea is failing to co-operate with an investigation into the killing of a South Korean tourist.

Park Wang-ja was shot dead by a North Korean soldier in a special tourism zone in the mountains of the communist state on Friday morning.

Hundreds of South Korean tourists have since vacated the mountain resort, just north of the heavily fortified border.

South Korea said trips to the area would be suspended pending an inquiry.

President Lee Myung-bak requested Pyongyang's help in investigating the shooting.

But a spokesman for South Korea's Unification Ministry - which is responsible for bilateral relations between the states - complained North Korean officials had not shown any "active response" to the request.

Forensic examination

Ms Park, 53, is said to have strayed into a fenced-off military area in the Mount Kumgang resort on the east coast in the pre-dawn hours of Friday morning.

She failed to heed a warning, and was shot dead, North Korean officials said.

Her body has been returned to South Korea, where it is undergoing forensic examination.

The killing has overshadowed an earlier announcement by Lee Myung-bak that he wanted to re-open the stalled dialogue with North Korea.

Mr Lee's decision to proceed with diplomatic overtures to North Korea despite the shooting has drawn criticism in the South Korean media.

The incident, which correspondents say is the first of its kind, was not publicised until after Mr Lee had told parliament in Seoul on Friday that he was ready to resume dialogue with the North.

Economic co-operation

The Mount Kumgang resort has attracted more than one million South Korean visitors since 1998.

With tours managed by South Korea's Hyundai group, the resort offers hotels, shops, a golf course and a spa - but it is also situated in a strategic naval zone.

Access to the special tourism zone is tightly controlled, and its border heavily policed.

The BBC's John Sudworth in Seoul says the resort - one of two North Korean tourist programmes - is one of the most visible symbols of the efforts by the two Koreas to engage in closer economic co-operation over the past decade.

The ventures have earned North Korea hundreds of millions of dollars in badly needed foreign currency.