World Council of Churches' (WCC) general secretary the Rev. Dr. Samuel Kobia will be leading a delegation of his organization's members this week to meet with churches in North Korea.

The Oct. 17-20 visit comes at the invitation of the government-sanctioned Korean Christian Federation (KCF) of North Korea, a group that has received support from the WCC for nearly 25 years. The visit will be the second from a WCC head in 10 years, after former general secretary Rev. Dr. Konrad Raiser's visit to the country in 1999.

"We will be meeting with the churches, government officials and learning about the life and witness of churches in North Korea," said delegation member Dr. Mathews George Chunakara, director of the WCC Public Witness program and the Commission of the Churches on International Affairs. "We will be participating in the worship service at Bong Soo Church in Pyongyang, where the WCC general secretary will preach."

After the visit to North Korea, the delegation will travel to Hong Kong to participate in an international consultation on peace, reconciliation and reunification of the Korean peninsula, which will be held from Oct. 21-23

The WCC's visit to North Korea comes nearly a week after country leader Kim Jong-Il alluded to the possibility of resuming "multilateral dialogue" regarding the country's nuclear program and other issues, depending on the, "outcome of bilateral dialogue with the US," according to sources.

South Korean officials have put pressure on the US to use their dialogue with North Korea to bring the country back into Six-Party Talks, which the country withdrew from earlier this year.

Former U.S. President George W. Bush commented this week during a forum in Seoul that the Six-Party talks are "the best way" to resolve issues on the Korean Peninsula, saying that progress will be made when, "China, (South) Korea, Japan, Russia and the United States speak in one voice, to say that there is a better way forward."