South Korea is to propose that reunions of families separated by the war-time division of the peninsula become a regular fixture, an official said Sunday, a day after Pyongyang suggested re-starting the programme.

Officials from South Korea's Red Cross will make the proposal to their counterparts in the north early this week, Unification Ministry Spokeswoman Lee Jong-Joo told AFP.

"During the meeting, we will also propose to turn the reunion programmes into regular ones, for instance, every month or every two months," Lee said.

The announcement came a day after the North's Red Cross Society suggested Pyongyang was ready to start arranging the reunions at the North's Mt. Kumgang resort on September 22.

The Unification Ministry, which handles inter-Korean affairs, said on Saturday Seoul was considering the proposal "positively".

The move comes despite strained ties between the two countries in the aftermath of the North's alleged torpedoing of a South Korean warship.

More than 120,000 South Koreans were registered as having family members in the North when the two countries were divided in the 1950-53 war.

In September last year, hundreds of Koreans had tearful reunions with relatives they had not seen for almost 60 years, as the humanitarian programme was resumed after a two-year hiatus.

But reunions petered out after Seoul ignored Pyongyang's request for massive food and fertiliser aid.

A conservative government which took office in Seoul in February 2008 took a tougher stance toward the nuclear-armed North Korea, suspending annual shipments of food and fertiliser.

Inter-Korean ties hit a new low after South Korea and its allies punished the North with fresh sanctions, accusing it of torpedoing one of its warships near their disputed sea border in March, killing 46 sailors.

But in an apparent easing of tensions after months of hostility, the North on Tuesday returned a South Korean fishing boat and its seven crew seized a month ago and requested flood aid from its neighbour.

Diplomatic efforts to resume long-stalled nuclear disarmament talks on the North also gained momentum since last month, with chief nuclear envoys from Beijing, Seoul, Tokyo and Washington holding a flurry of meetings with each other.

Stephen Bosworth, Washington's special envoy to North Korean affairs, arrived in South Korea Sunday to discuss resumption of the talks long deadlocked since last year.

Bosworth will meet Monday with Wi Sung-Lac, Seoul's chief nuclear negotiator, and acting foreign minister Shin Kak-Soo during his three-day visit to Seoul before flying to Tokyo and later Beijing.

Pyongyang stormed out of the talks in April last year, following a UN reprimand over a long-range rocket test, and conducted the second nuclear test in May.

But in late August, Chinese President Hu Jintao received North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il, with both pressing for a resumption of the six-party talks composed of the United States, China, the two Koreas, Japan and Russia.