Seoul says Moody's to visit North Korea on Friday

SEOUL, Feb 6 (Reuters) Moody's Investors Service plans to visit North Korea during a trip to review South Korea's sovereign rating in order to assess risks from the North, South Korea's finance ministry said today.

The ratings agency is sensitive to Pyongyang's nuclear programme and the cost of reunification of the two countries, the ministry said.

Moody's sovereign analysts Thomas Byrne and Steven Hess are on Friday going to the Kaesong Industrial Complex, just inside the North Korean border with South Korea.

The trip is part of their February 9-14 visit to South Korea, Asia's third-largest economy.

''Moody's takes into account seriously the risks related to the North, such as unification costs and the nuclear issue in its review of the South's rating,'' Chang Eui-soon, a South Korea's finance ministry official said.

''The trip to Kaesong will show we can reduce unification costs as the complex is a good example of economic cooperation between the two Koreas,'' he added.

The visit, when six-party talks to end North's nuclear programme are set to be underway, will be the first by a ratings agency to the communist country, Chang said.

Pyongyang heads into talks with the South, China, Japan, Russia and the United States, which resume on Thursday, with signs the impoverished state may be ready to agree to an initial deal over demands it stop building a nuclear arsenal in exchange for aid.

Moody's has an A3 rating on South Korea while Standard and Poor's Ratings Services puts the country at A. Fitch has A-plus.

REUTERS AKJ KP1338