South Korea on Wednesday approved a trip to North Korea by aides to the wife of former president Kim Dae-jung this week aimed at discussing her possible visit there, the unification ministry said.

Lee Hee-ho, the widow of the late president, hopes to travel to the communist nation on a humanitarian mission. President Park Geun-hye responded positively to Lee's plan.

A group of Lee's aides is scheduled to meet with North Korean officials in Kaesong, the North's border town, on Friday.

"The government has approved their application for a visit to North Korea," the ministry's spokesman Lim Byeong-cheol said at a press briefing.

Five officials from the Kim Dae Jung Peace Center and the Friends of Love, a charity founded by Lee, plan to visit Kaesong, together with two drivers, according to Lim.

They plan to hold working-level consultations with representatives from the North's Asia-Pacific Peace Committee on the date and logistics of Lee's trip to North Korea, Lim said.

Lee, 92, is seeking to visit the North to support an aid program to provide babies and kids there with knit hats, scarves and clothes.

She last traveled to Pyongyang in December 2011 to attend the funeral of Kim Jong-il. At that time, she met with the current leader, Kim Jong-un.

Lee's late husband is respected both in South and North Korea for his efforts to improve inter-Korean relations in the early 2000s, for which he was awarded the year 2000 Nobel Peace Prize. (Yonhap)