Unification Minister Ryoo Kihl-jae's weeklong visit is also intended to seek understanding on Seoul's approach towards Pyongyang amid drawn-out military tensions on the peninsula.
He plans to stay in Washington D.C. from Tuesday through Thursday, where he will meet with Acting Deputy Secretary Wendy Sherman and senior Congressmen including Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) and Rep. Ed Royce (R-CA), according to his ministry.
Rubio is a ranking member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee's East Asian and Pacific Affairs subcommittee, and Royce chairs the House Foreign Affairs Committee.
Ryoo is also scheduled to attend the Korea Global Forum to be hosted by the East Asia Institute and hold a roundtable meeting with American experts on North Korea.
"Ryoo's trip is expected to serve as an opportunity for communication" with U.S. officials and experts, ministry spokesman Lim Byeong-cheol said at a press briefing.
Before flying into the U.S. capital, he added, Ryoo will travel to New York for a series of meetings with officials from such U.N. agencies as the UNFPA, UNICEP and the UNDP to discuss humanitarian aid for the North.
To be discussed are ways to strengthen cooperation in South Korea's implementation of President Park's landmark "Dresden Declaration," Lim said.
During her trip to the former East German city in March, Park laid out a three-point proposal to the North for the "humanity, co-prosperity, and integration" of the two Koreas. It includes plans to provide assistance to the North's mothers and infants in need.
On his way back to Seoul, the minister will stop by Los Angeles, home to the largest Korean community in the U.S., to deliver a lecture to youths there.
It will be the first trip to the U.S. by South Korea's unification minister since 2011, when Ryoo's predecessor, Yu Woo-ik, visited there.
A unification ministry official said Ryoo is considering similar trips to other nations next year to exchange views on the North Korea issue.
In May, he traveled to Shanghai, China, to participate in the Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia (CICA) on behalf of President Park Geun-hye. It was his first overseas trip since taking office nearly two years ago.