South Korean flag displayed for the first time at sporting event in North Korea

South Korea's national anthem was broadcast and its national flag shown in North Korea for the first time at a recent weightlifting tournament, the latest indication of gradually improving ties between Seoul and Pyongyang.

North Korean state media reported that South Korean athletes took gold and silver in an 85-kilogram (187-pound) division at a stadium in Pyongyang. At the medal ceremony, the crowd stood as two South Korean flags were raised and the South Korean national anthem played, the Associated Press reported from Pyongyang.

Seoul agreed to send a team to the Asian Cup Weightlifting Championships after North Korea approved the display of the South's flag and broadcast of its anthem at medal ceremonies for the first time.

South Korea has never sent competitors to international sports tournaments in the North before because of Pyongyang's ban on the South's flag and anthem.

The two countries remain technically in a state of war after the 1950-1953 Korean War concluded with an armistice rather than a peace treaty. North Korea claims sovereignty over South Korea.

Amid political tensions, sporting exchanges have continued. In recent months, the North sent its women's football team to a tournament in the South. Seoul allows the North's anthem to be played and flag to be shown at sporting events in the South.

The two Koreas have made other progress in stepping back from heated rhetoric earlier this year, when the North threatened the South with attack during military exercises held by the South and its US allies in South Korea.

South Korea's hosting of major sporting events is explored in a feature in the September/October 2013 issue of Australasian Leisure Management.