South Korea is to propose to Japan Friday to carry out a joint maritime survey on oil and gas on the continental shelf between them, South Korea's Yonhap News reported.

The proposal will be made at Friday's meeting between Chung Sye-kyun, South Korea's Minister of Commerce, Industry and Energy, and Chung's Japanese counterpart Toshihiro Nikai in Tokyo, Yonhap quoted unnamed South Korean official as saying.

"Preliminary surveys of the area have raised the possibility of undersea geographical features that could contain gas and oil," Yohap quoted an official of the Commerce Ministry as saying, adding the estimated gas reserve in the area is 36 million tons.

According to Yonhap, South Korea suggests conducting the survey in an 82,557-square-km waters between South Korea's Jeju Island and northwest of Japan's Ryuku Island chain.

The two neighbors set up the area in 1978 to explore gas and oil in the continental shelf.

(Xinhua News Agency May 26, 2006)