Seoul (AsiaNews) – Three South Korean army officers were wounded in an explosion while they are on patrol near the border with North Korea, a heavily mined, tension-filled area separating the two sides that remain technically at war.
Military sources in Seoul report that the incident occurred around 11:00 am south of the Military Demarcation Line (MDL) within the Demilitarised Zone (DMZ), one of the most heavily fortified and mined borders in the world.
Two of the wounded officers were evacuated by helicopter, while a third was moved over land before being airlifted, this according to a statement from the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS).
At present, no further information regarding the blast is available, and it remains unclear whether the blast was caused by a North Korean mine, a South Korean mine, or another type of explosive device.
The three officers "were injured by an explosion of unknown cause while conducting an operation at a location south of the MDL", the JCS said in a statement.
South Korea’s military has not yet provided details about the gravity of the officers' injuries, but local sources report that one is in serious conditions.
The DMZ is a buffer zone 248 km-long and approximately 4-km wide that has divided the Korean Peninsula since the 1953 armistice. The civil war, which lasted three years, has never officially ended.
The two states stopped fighting but never signed a peace treaty. Consequently, the conflict remains active, at least diplomatically and politically, characterised by long periods of hostility and rare thaws in tensions.
Although the zone itself is officially demilitarised, its northern and southern boundaries are among the most heavily fortified borders in the world. An estimated 800,000 mines are buried in the area, according to military data cited by the Yonhap news agency, many dating back to the war itself, though mine-laying has continued in recent years.
Since 2024, after North Korean leader Kim Jong-un designated South Korea as his country’s “principal enemy”, Pyongyang’s military has laid mines and built anti-tank barriers along the border as part of efforts to permanently seal the frontier.
In the past, the South Korean military reported incidents similar to today's, involving the death or injury of North Korean soldiers due to accidental mine explosions during construction work or patrol operations.
Landmine-related accidents have repeatedly heightened tensions between the two Koreas; in one of the most serious incidents, in 2015, two South Korean soldiers were severely injured when a landmine exploded on the southern side of the DMZ with one losing both legs.
At the time, South Korea concluded that North Korean troops had crossed the MDL to plant landmines, an accusation North Korea has consistently and vehemently denied. In response, South Korea resumed loudspeaker broadcasts directed at the North along the border.
The latest incident comes as South Korean President Lee Jae-myung continues to call for unconditional talks with the North; however, the overtures made so far by Seoul have met with no response from Pyongyang.
