South Korean private aid groups are scurrying to resume their humanitarian assistance to the North, which has been virtually suspended amid inter-Korean tensions caused by the communist country‘s nuclear bomb test in February, sources said Monday.

“Several groups are making internal preparations in order to resume their assistance projects,” an official of a local aid group told Yonhap News Agency. “Since the North’s offer to hold inter-Korean government talks last month, the country has shown its intention to accept humanitarian aid (from the South) again and to resume private-level exchange and cooperation,” the official said.

Since the Feb. 12 nuclear test escalated tensions on the Korean Peninsula, the North has been dismissing local aid groups‘ requests for cooperation in sending food and medicine as humanitarian assistance to the North.

Amid the tensions, South Korean private groups’ humanitarian aid has come to a standstill from March. Christian charity foundation Eugene Bell was the only local aid group sending humanitarian assistance to the North after the February test. The group sent tuberculosis medicine to the North in April.

A source well versed in the North Korean situation said that during a meeting held between South and North Korean religious figures in Beijing on June 13, the North Korean side raised the need for inter-Korean humanitarian aid as well as other non-political exchanges to resume.

The rapprochement mood led local aid groups to reactivate their aid programs with the Ministry of Unification, which handles inter-Korean affairs, saying, “Three local aid groups applied in June for approval for their plans to send humanitarian aid goods to the North.”

The resumption efforts come amid the two Koreas‘ tie-mending moves. The countries agreed to reopen the suspended joint factory park in the North Korean border city of Gaeseong during their working-level talks held over the weekend.

It was the second working-level dialogue held between the South’s Park Geun-hye administration and the North after they held one last month. (Yonhap News)