President Moon to propose projects for peace use of DMZ

Posted on : 2018-04-26 18:30 KST Modified on : 2019-10-19 20:29 KST
A world peace park and joint firefighting unit are two ideas under consideration
Wire fence along the Demilitarized Line
Wire fence along the Demilitarized Line

South Korean President Moon Jae-in plans to propose pilot projects for peaceful use of the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) during his Apr. 27 summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, it was reported on Apr. 25.

With Moon planning to attempt a basic agreement with Kim on “demilitarizing the DMZ” to achieve the establishment of permanent peace on the Korean Peninsula as one of his three main agenda items for the talks, the pilot projects could offer a first step in this direction while posing a comparatively small political and military burden.

The administration is reportedly considering several potential pilot projects to propose to the North, including the ambitious “world peace park” plan for the DMZ from the Park Geun-hye administration and joint extinguishing of forest fires in the DMZ by South and North Korean military authorities.

The first idea has already received close policy examination by the Ministry of Unification and administration and is consistent with Moon’s repeated emphasis on preparing and executing a “non-partisan” summit. The second would be both highly symbolic – with military authorities from both sides cooperating in a region of acute military tensions – and realistically necessary. Indeed, a Ministry of National Defense senior official explained, “We have a lot of difficulties putting out fires in the DMZ because we can’t fly helicopters out there.”

“If South and North are going to do something jointly in the DMZ, the first thing that comes to mind is extinguishing forest fires,” the official said.

While it does not concern the land-based section of the DMZ, another area expected to receive major focus at the summit is the restoration of a “joint fishing area” and “peace area” in the waters near the Northern Limit Line (NLL) in the West Sea, which was agreed upon at a 2007 inter-Korean summit (Item 3 from the Oct. 4 Joint Declaration) but not implemented.

In an Apr. 17 briefing, Presidential Chief of Staff and inter-Korean summit preparation committee chairman Im Jong-seok previously hinted at behind-the-scenes discussions on the matter between South and North.

“The practical demilitarization of the Demilitarized Zone is an area of interest,” Im said at the time. The “demilitarization” referred to by Im consists broadly of military and non-military measures. Key to the military measures is a withdrawal of all South and North Korean troops and armaments from the DMZ, which has become a heavily militarized zone over the 65 years since the Armistice agreement.

But military measures such as the withdrawal of guard posts (GPs) represent a highly volatile issue in political and military terms with and involve a complex array of matters for both sides to resolve internally, including objections by the military and conservatives, relation to the Armistice agreement, and issues with the UN Command. For that reason, it remains difficult to predict how much progress can be made at the summit.

In contrast, non-military measures – in other words, peaceful uses of the DMZ – carry a relatively smaller burden than military ones. At senior-level inter-Korean talks in the early 1990s, the two sides reached an agreement to “discuss and carry out . . . the peaceful utilization of the Demilitarized Zone” (Chapter I, Article 12 of the Inter-Korean Basic Agreement), which merely has not been actively put into practice.

A representative example of peaceful use is the clearing of all land mines, troops, and weapons from areas measuring 250m×4㎞ on the Gyeongui (West Sea) railway line and 100m×4㎞ on the East Sea line where railway and roads pass through the Military Demarcation Line (MDL) and DMZ in order to connect the railways after the first and second inter-Korean summits in the 2000s. In a broader sense, another example of peaceful use of the DMZ is the creation of a “peace corridor” just north of the DMZ with the Kaesong Industrial Complex project to the west and the Mt. Keumgang tourism project to the east.

“In terms of the practical demilitarization of the DMZ, we will need to actively consult the examples of the West Sea and East Sea railways lines in the 2000s,” a Ministry of National Defense senior official said.

Speaking on condition of anonymity, one expert explained, “Measures to build military trust are complex and contain a whole lot of parts.”

“A realistic approach may be for the two leaders to agree in principle on demilitarizing the DMZ as a military trust-building measure at the summit and carry out a few pilot efforts to start out with as they go about [sensitive military measures] on a step-by-step basis,” the expert suggested.

By Park Byong-su, senior staff writer and Lee Je-hoon, staff reporter

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