A veteran Japanese maestro will conduct Beethoven's Ninth Symphony in North Korea, his spokesman said on tuesday, in a rare cultural exchange amid lingering mutual suspicion between the two nations. Michiyoshi Inoue and members of his orchestra have already arrived in Pyongyang at the invitation of the North's State Symphony Orchestra. Inoue, music director of the Orchestra Ensemble Kanazawa in Ishikawa, central Japan, was quoted as saying, ‘This is a pure cultural exchange and nothing to do with diplomacy.’