South Korea's defense ministry has proposed military talks with North Korea to resolve discrepancies over the Military Demarcation Line (MDL) inside the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) and to restore severed military hotlines.
Kim Hong-cheol, director general for defense policy at the Ministry of National Defense, said on the 23rd that Seoul was "officially proposing to the North Korean authorities that inter-Korean military talks be held to mutually confirm the precise location of the ground Military Demarcation Line and to discuss the restoration of military communication lines and ways to prevent accidental clashes in the border area."
It is the second such offer, following an initial proposal in November last year for military talks to address the setting of the MDL baseline. The repeated overture comes as military tension along the MDL has escalated after recent landmine explosions involving North Korean troops.
Citing injuries to South Korean soldiers caused by a North Korean landmine blast on the 21st of last month, Kim said it was "difficult to predict what other situation might arise if conditions like this at the MDL between the two Koreas continue to be left unaddressed." He added that "the situation in which the two sides have differing perceptions of some MDL locations remains unchanged, and without extraordinary measures, soldiers will operate based on the positions each side recognizes, which is a factor that raises the possibility of accidental clashes."
"If necessary, three-way talks including the United Nations Command are also possible," he said. "We hope for a positive response from the North."
The South Korean military uses the MDL as established on military maps by the U.S. National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency in 2004. The U.N. Command relies on coordinates it generated on its own through an "MDL project" in 2016, while the North Korean military uses its own MDL based on lines connecting boundary markers. The military believes this is why discrepancies in MDL recognition arise.
The two Koreas previously maintained three liaison channels, including the Panmunjom line and military hotlines on the east and west coasts, but North Korea cut all of them after April 7, 2023, leaving communications severed for more than three years. The last inter-Korean military talks were the 10th round of general-level talks held in October 2018.
Separately, according to the offices of lawmakers on the National Assembly's Intelligence Committee and National Defense Committee, military authorities reported to parliament that North Korea is estimated to have laid a total of 960,000 landmines in the DMZ area since 2024. Military experts put the total number of mines inside the DMZ at about 2 million, including those laid by the South Korean military.
The large-scale mine-laying is seen as part of a border fortification effort North Korea has been pursuing since defining inter-Korean relations as those of "two hostile states." Since April 2024, the North has been laying mines, building barriers, installing barbed wire and constructing tactical roads along the MDL.
The South Korean military has continued response measures such as warning broadcasts and warning shots against North Korean soldiers crossing the MDL. The North has protested that such measures threaten the safety of its troops and has countered by signaling a resumption of loudspeaker broadcasts aimed at the South.