Smog from forest fires on Indonesia's Sumatra island eased in Singapore on Tuesday but the city-state continued to press its larger neighbour to solve the recurring problem. Singapore's Pollutant Standards Index fell to a "moderate" rating of 82-88 before nightfall on Tuesday under an air-quality monitoring system that classifies any reading above 100 as "unhealthy". The index had peaked at 155 on Monday night, Singapore's worst outbreak of cross-border air pollution since 2006.

South Korean Ambassador to Japan Lee Byung Kee on Tuesday proposed to Japanese Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida that a bilateral meeting of the two countries' foreign ministers be held on the sidelines of the ASEAN Regional Forum in Brunei on July 2. The proposal was made during their first meeting at the Japanese Foreign Ministry in Tokyo. The Japanese government is expected to agree to the proposal, sources close to the matter said.

South Korea opposes talks for the sake of talks with North Korea in the absence of positive signs that it intends to denuclearize, Seoul's chief nuclear envoy said Tuesday as a senior North Korean official arrived in Beijing for a strategic dialogue with China.

SEOUL, June 18 (Yonhap) -- North Korean religious leaders expressed disappointment over the cancellation of inter-Korean talks said they and hope a new round of negotiations can take place to ease regional tensions, a South Korean group said Tuesday. The Seoul-based Korea Conference of Religion for Peace (KCRP) said its representatives met with counterparts from the North's Korean Council of Religionists (KCR) in Beijing last Thursday and exchanged views on how best they can contribute to peace on the Korean Peninsula.