South Korea plans to provide North Korea with more than 1,400 medical supplies, including automated external defibrillators, under a humanitarian medical aid program.

According to the report of the foreign news agency, the Ministry of Unification of South Korea has prepared a list of 1431 medical items of 166 types for a hospital in Pyongyang, the capital of North Korea. This equipment will be needed for diagnosis, surgery and treatment.

According to the official document, the news agency reported that the equipment, worth about 6.75 million dollars, includes X-ray machines, stethoscopes and diagnostic equipment including blood pressure monitors, as well as operation theater tables and other medical equipment for surgery and treatment.

The Unification Ministry has said that the final decision on the plan is subject to negotiations with North Korea and may be subject to change.

Some members of South Korea’s National Assembly have expressed concerns over the plan, saying medical equipment could be diverted to the production of biological weapons or used for other purposes, such as testing for flaws in weapons systems.

South Korea’s Unification Minister Chung Dong-yong dismissed these concerns, saying that humanitarian medical aid should not be linked to North Korea’s military policy.

He said that the medical conditions in North Korea are so bad that urgent help is needed there.

It should be noted that due to the strained relations between the two rival countries, inter-Korean contacts and means of negotiation have almost ended, so it is not clear whether Pyongyang will be willing to accept the aid offered by South Korea or not.

Seoul won an exemption from sanctions in May by the UN Security Council’s North Korea Sanctions Committee to provide medical equipment.