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SEOUL, Jan. 25 (Yonhap) -- A hard-line labor confederation decided Thursday to return to a dialogue panel with the government and management for the first time in eight years.
The new leaders of the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions (KCTU), one of the country's two major union groups, made the decision during a central committee meeting.
The presidential advisory committee was set up in 1998 in the wake of the Asian foreign exchange crisis.
The KCTU walked out of the committee the following year. The Federation of Korean Trade Unions, which is a larger and moderate group, also quit the tripartite panel in 2016. Late last year it expressed its willingness to return to dialogue.
Last Friday, the KCTU also indicated its intention to rejoin the panel when its recently elected leader met President Moon Jae-in.
The presidential office Cheong Wa Dae welcomed the KCTU's decision.
"We hope that social dialogue (among all concerned parties) will proceed well," Park Soo-hyun, the presidential spokesman, said in a message sent to reporters.
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