NK may have floated mines on purpose

By Jung Sung-ki

The government is looking into the possibility that North Korea might have released wooden-boxed landmines to threaten South Korean coastlines, a senior official said Wednesday.

The remarks by the official at the presidential office drew attention, as the government had been cautious about commenting on the North’s possibly intentional release of anti-personnel mines to float down to the South and instead believed the mines discovered so far had been swept down by torrential rains.

North Korea has been hit by heavy rainfall in recent weeks and was forced to discharge dam water into rivers flowing to the South.

A 48-year-old South Korean man was killed on July 31 due to a wooden-boxed mine exploding near a restricted area of Yeoncheon, about 60 kilometers northeast of Seoul.

Since then, the military has uncovered a total of 119 similar mines near rivers and islands close to the West Sea border, according to the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

“We’re paying close attention to the fact that so many wooden-boxed mines have been found this year, compared to the past even though the North has often been hit by torrential rains before,” the official said. “The Ministry of National Defense already sent a message to the North, urging it to take control of its landmines so they do not drift to the South.”

This latest episode comes amid escalating tension between the two Koreas over the sinking of South Korea’s warship the Cheonan in March.

In response to South Korea’s anti-submarine exercises in the West Sea from July 29 to Aug. 2, North Korea fired nearly 120 artillery rounds off the west coast near the Northern Limit Line, the de facto sea border.

As another tactic North Korea also seized and detained a South Korean squid boat Sunday in the East Sea.

The Ministry of Unification sent a message to the North Wednesday, demanding the prompt release of the 7-member crew of the 41 ton boat.

North Korea accepted the message delivered through a west coast military hotline between the two countries at 10 a.m., ministry spokeswoman Lee Jong-joo said in a briefing.

The message, addressed to the North's top Red Cross official, contains a call by his South Korean counterpart to free the four South Korean and three Chinese crew members of the Daeseung “promptly in line with international law and customs and on humanitarian grounds,” Lee said.

South Korea is investigating whether the 41 ton boat, which had left for a joint fishing area off the east coast of the Korean Peninsula on Aug. 1, trespassed into the North's exclusive economic zone. Pyongyang has yet to offer any word on the state of the crew.