SEOUL: South Korea's conciliatory gestures to North Korea following the death of Kim Jong-Il are intended to show it is not hostile towards its neighbour, President Lee Myung-Bak said Thursday.
Lee, who is often reviled by Pyongyang as a "traitor", also expressed hope the communist state would regain stability as soon as possible, according to his office.
South Korea has made a series of conciliatory gestures, sending its sympathies to the North Korean people for the death and scrapping a plan to display Christmas lights near their shared border.
The communist North had denounced the lights plan as "psychological warfare" by its capitalist neighbour.
"We have taken such measures basically to show we are not hostile towards North Korea," Lee told a meeting of political leaders.
"An early stabilisation of North Korea's system is in the interests of neighbouring countries."
Lee also said the South is willing to soften its stance.
"There is room for exercising our flexibility as much as possible in future relations with North Korea," he said.
Cross-border ties have been frosty since the conservative Lee took office in February 2008 and linked major aid to nuclear disarmament, a stance which enraged the North.
Relations turned icy when Seoul accused Pyongyang of torpedoing a warship with the loss of 46 lives in March 2010 and cut most trade and aid with its impoverished neighbour.
The North angrily denied involvement in the sinking. But it shelled a South Korean border island in November 2010, killing four people and briefly stoking fears of war.
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