Thousands of journalists who gathered at a press center in Seoul held their breath and stopped work for a moment when South Korean President Moon Jae-in shook hands with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un after disembarking from a plane at an airport in Pyongyang.

Even the sound of computer typing fell away as they fixed their eyes or cameras on a large screen set up to show the summit meetings between Moon and Kim. Some stopped walking and took out their mobile phones to capture the historic moment.

President Moon landed at Sunan International Airport in Pyongyang at around 9:50 a.m. after a flight of less than a hour from Seoul. North Korean leader Kim and his wife, Ri Sol-ju, made a surprise appearance at the airport to welcome the South Korean leader.

Moon and Kim shook hands on the tarmac and hugged each other several times before walking down a red carpet, chatting. They also jointly reviewed a military honor guard.

To cover the third inter-Korean summit, about 2,700 reporters from home and abroad gathered at a press conference held by the South Korean government in central Seoul. The press center was filled with excitement and nervousness.

The mood, however, was relatively calm compared with about five months ago when many reporters were apparently awestruck as they watched the first-ever handshakes between Moon and Kim at the truce village of Panmunjom.

There was no such applause or sighs of excitement and awe this time. Measured expectations and realistic hopes dominated the overall mood of the press pack, reflecting apparent recognition of what has happened since the first summit in April and the challenges the two Koreas are currently facing.

A flurry of summit diplomacy involving the two Koreas and the US has taken place over the past months. Moon and Kim held their second summit in May, which was followed by an unprecedented summit between the North and the US in Singapore.

Denuclearization talks, however, have been stalled recently as Pyongyang and Washington appear at odds over how to rid the North of its nuclear weapons program.

The third recent inter-Korean summit comes as cooperative projects between the two Koreas have almost come to a standstill, with Washington calling for sanctions to remain in place until the North takes more substantive denuclearization steps.

Journalists hoped that the best would come out of the talks and the airport handshakes and hugging might be a good signal, though they cautioned against too much optimism.

"To me, it showed a warm atmosphere. The two heads of state hugged and, yes, I think it was strong symbolism (of warmth) from that scene at the airport," said Katharina Graca Peters, a correspondent of Der Spiegel in Hamburg, Germany.

"The summit is used for trust building, moving forward the process. Then I would say it is a good indication that there can be progress, they can move forward in terms of trust building. In terms of concrete outcome, I am afraid I cannot answer this because we will see what happens," she added.

Others said the friendly scenes at the airport might belie the reality and the South Korean president faces a more challenging task than he did back in April, as he will have to serve as a mediator between Pyongyang and Washington and move the stalled denuclearization talks forward.

"I think especially as you look at the inter-Korean summit with literally the eyes of the world on it, I think optically, it presents a good image for the summit itself to have two heads of state meeting right away," Steven Miller, a reporter with Voice of America, said.

"(The) more challenging aspect of this summit would be for Moon to act as a liaison or mediator between President Trump and Kim Jong-un to try to find middle ground to continue denuclearization talks given the gap of what the US is saying," he added. (Yonhap)