South Korea prepared Thursday for high-level talks with North Korea expected to cover various pending issues, including the reunions of families torn apart by the 1950-53 Korean War and the resumption of a suspended joint tour program.

The vice-ministerial meeting will kick off at a joint industrial park in the North's border city of Kaesong at 10:30 a.m. on Friday to follow up on a rare deal in August on defusing military tension, officials said.

The agenda for the upcoming talks has not been confirmed yet, but the South is widely expected to place a priority on the issue of separated families, calling for regular reunions for them.

North Korea is likely to call on the South to resume a joint tour program at Mount Kumgang in the North, which has been suspended since 2008 following the fatal shooting of a South Korean tourist.

The two Koreas held reunions for separated families in October at a facility on Mount Kumgang on the North's east coast. But Seoul said such a one-off event is too insufficient to fulfill the expectations of the surviving 66,000 family members in South Korea.

The North is seeking to press Seoul to reopen the tour program, apparently to earn hard currency at a time when the North is under relevant United Nations Security Council sanctions banning the North's nuclear and missile tests.

The Friday talks will be represented by Vice Unification Minister Hwang Boo-gi from the South and Jon Jong-su, vice director of the secretariat of North Korea's Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of Korea. (Yonhap)