Questions are mounting over a suspected landmine explosion in the Demilitarized Zone along the western front. About 40 officials from the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the United Nations Command began an on-site investigation on the 27th near the Military Demarcation Line in Paju, Gyeonggi Province. That came six days after the accident. The military says it had no choice but to secure access routes in advance to protect the investigators. Yet it is hard to accept that no immediate on-site inquiry took place in a grave security matter in which an officer and soldiers were seriously wounded and the possibility that North Korean troops laid the mines has been raised.
On the 21st, 18 members of the Army 25th Division's reconnaissance battalion were clearing a search route in the DMZ when a suspected mine detonated, wounding three, including the battalion commander, a lieutenant colonel. Despite the severity of the accident, the military cannot escape criticism over the long-delayed site investigation and concerns that evidence may have been compromised. Criticism has now surfaced even within the ruling party, and the opposition is demanding a joint parliamentary hearing, raising the likelihood that the issue becomes a political flashpoint. A Presidential Office official said there was "no basis whatsoever for suspicion" regarding the investigation, but inadequate follow-up measures and excessive secrecy only deepen doubts. The military must quickly determine how the explosives were laid and whether North Korean troops crossed the line, along with the details of the investigation itself, and disclose the findings transparently.
A separate controversy over the transfer to South Korea of two North Korean soldiers recently captured by Ukrainian forces also calls into question the government's North Korea policy and its duty to explain. It is not desirable that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy disclosed the transfer first, after which the two sides gave conflicting accounts of whether there had been an undisclosed agreement. The government has a responsibility to explain what consultations took place, at least to the National Assembly, to the extent that doing so does not endanger the safety of those involved, and to clear up the diplomatic confusion.
Both the suspected mine explosion and the transfer of the North Korean prisoners are sensitive matters that will affect inter-Korean relations. That is all the more true given talk of a possible North Korea-U.S. summit. North Korea was also reportedly discussed at last week's summit between the United States and China. But the South Korean government must not respond by deferring to Pyongyang out of such considerations. The more a matter concerns national security, the more the government must secure public trust through unwavering principles and transparent disclosure of information.
