Foreign Minister Cho Hyun on Thursday called on North Korea to respond to Seoul's offers for dialogue and join efforts to promote peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula at a regional security forum in Manila, the foreign ministry said. Cho made the remarks during the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF), a 27-member multilateral security forum attended by the 11 Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) member states and major regional powers, including the United States, China, Japan and Russia. The ARF is the only regional multilateral security forum in which both South and North Korea participate, but Pyongyang was absent from this year's session for the second consecutive year. Cho said peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula remain essential to the security and prosperity of the region, reaffirming Seoul's efforts to build a peninsula where the two Koreas can coexist peacefully and grow together. "Such efforts cannot bear fruit through the will of one side alone. I hope North Korea would respond to our sincere efforts for dialogue and cooperation," Cho was quoted as saying by th