North Korean soldiers are seen at a guard post inside the Demilitarized Zone that divides the Korean Peninsula in an undated photo provided by South Korea’s Ministry of National Defense on Nov. 27, 2023. (South Korea Ministry of National Defense)
CAMP HUMPHREYS, South Korea — North Korean troops have been observed creating anti-tank barriers, reinforcing roads and carrying out other military projects within the Demilitarized Zone, according to the South’s military on Monday.
South Korean intelligence agencies spotted the improvements near the border in recent days, army Col. Lee Seong-jun, a spokesman for the country’s Joint Chiefs of Staff, said during a news conference Monday.
Lee declined to elaborate on the North’s activities at the border and said the South’s military was still analyzing its operations.
North Korean troops were also observed building walls and roads between the Military Demarcation Line — the actual border between the two Koreas — and the Demilitarized Zone, an unidentified military source said in a Yonhap News report Saturday.
The 2½-mile-wide DMZ spans 150 miles across the Korean Peninsula from coast to coast.
Details of the North’s activities come days after roughly 20 troops crossed the demarcation line and trespassed into the South, according to Seoul. The South Korean military fired warning shots to alert the North Korean soldiers, who then promptly returned to their side of the border on June 9.
Lee said Monday the North Korean soldiers “may have wandered” due to overgrown trees that obscured visibility and the lack of roads in the area.
This is not the first military activity the South has observed amid deteriorating relations with the North. Since December, the communist regime has laid landmines near the border, rebuilt guard posts and reinstated its policy to arm border guards, according to the South’s military.
Pyongyang has sent more than 1,200 balloons carrying trash over its southern border since May 28 in response to balloons carrying humanitarian aid sent northward by South Korean activists.
One of the North’s trash-laden balloons landed near an elementary school on June 2 in Osan Air Base, roughly 30 miles south of Seoul. No injuries or damage were reported.
South Korea on June 4 formally suspended its military deconfliction agreement with the North, citing Pyongyang’s ballistic missile and satellite tests and its balloon campaign. North Korea conducted four satellite launches within the past year and fired over a dozen ballistic missiles on six separate days of testing since January.
The agreement signed in 2018 prohibited the two countries from conducting a host of military activities, including conducting artillery drills and flying aircraft near the border.
North Korea is “solely responsible for causing this situation” and Seoul will resume all suspended activities at the border “until mutual trust … is restored,” the South’s military said in a statement on June 4.
