THE rival Koreas agreed today to form their first unified Olympic team and have their athletes parade together for the first time in 11 years during the opening ceremony of next month’s Winter Olympics in South Korea.

The agreements still require approval from the International Olympic Committee (IOC). But they are the most prominent steps toward rapprochement achieved by the Koreas since they recently began exploring co-operation during the Olympics following a year of heightened tension over the North’s nuclear weapons programme.

During their third day of talks at the border in about a week, senior officials reached a package of agreements including fielding a joint women’s ice hockey team and marching together under a “unification flag” depicting their peninsula during the opening ceremony, Seoul’s Unification Ministry said.