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| Sports Minister Do Jong-hwan answers questions from reporters at Incheon International Airport, Wednesday, before heading to Switzerland. Yonhap |
South Korean Sports Minister Do Jong-hwan headed to Switzerland on Wednesday for a meeting with representatives from North Korea and the International Olympic Committee (IOC) over further inter-Korean sports cooperation.
The tripartite meeting, scheduled for Friday at the IOC headquarters in Lausanne, will cover the organization of unified Korean teams at the 2020 Tokyo Summer Olympics and a joint Korean bid for the 2032 Summer Games.
The South Korean delegation will also include Lee Kee-heung, president of the Korean Sport & Olympic Committee, and Ryu Seung-min, the lone South Korean member of the IOC.
North Korean Sports Minister Kim Il-guk will lead his country's delegation.
The Koreas have agreed to field joint teams at the next Summer Olympics in a little over a year's time. They made Olympic history a year ago when they formed a unified women's hockey team at the PyeongChang Winter Games, and also competed under one flag in canoeing, rowing and women's basketball at the Asian Games in Indonesia later in 2018.
The Koreas also came together at recent international competitions for table tennis and handball.
In two previous rounds of sports talks, the two sides agreed that they will pursue joint teams in sports where they have prior experience of competing together.
Women's basketball, rowing and canoeing appear to be logical candidates, since the Koreas thrived in those events just months ago at the Asian Games.
In dragon boat racing, which is a canoeing discipline, the unified Korean team won the gold medal in the women's 500 meters, and the bronze medal in both the women's 200m and the men's 1,000m.
The Koreas combined for the silver medal behind China in women's basketball.
South Korea has suggested combined teams in swimming and water polo, while North Korea is seeking joint teams in table tennis and weightlifting.
The two sides have a long history of partnership in table tennis, dating back to the 1991 World Table Tennis Championships in Japan.
In May 2018, the two Korean women's teams joined forces at the World Team Table Tennis Championships in Sweden. Two months later, the Koreas had four unified teams at the International Table Tennis Federation (ITTF) World Tour Platinum Korea Open in Daejeon, 160 kilometers south of Seoul. The mixed doubles team of Jang Woo-jin (South) and Cha Hyo-sim (North) won the gold medal there, and they followed that up with a silver medal at the ITTF World Tour Grand Finals in Incheon, just west of Seoul, in December.
South Korean officials have maintained they'll try to ensure their own athletes won't have to give up their Olympic spots to make room for North Koreans on joint teams.
Before PyeongChang 2018, the IOC allowed the joint Korean women's hockey team to carry an expanded squad of 35, as 12 North Korean players were added to the South Korean team of 23. But the games roster of 22 players remained unchanged, and at least three North Korean players had to dress for each game. That forced a handful of South Korean players to take turns in sitting out games, which didn't sit well with detractors of the unified team project.
There will be five table tennis disciplines at Tokyo 2020: men's and women's singles, mixed doubles, and men's and women's team events. The Korea Table Tennis Association (KTTA) is pushing for a joint Korean team in the mixed doubles, in addition to one tandem each for the South and the North.
Also at the upcoming meeting, the Koreas will submit to the IOC their letter of intent to co-host the 2032 Summer Olympics.
Seoul was chosen as the South Korean candidate city Monday, and Pyongyang is expected to be the North Korean candidate for the joint bid.
South Korean President Moon Jae-in and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un agreed to pursue the joint Olympic bid during their summit last September.
No Olympic Games, summer or winter, have been co-hosted by two nations. (Yonhap)
