Former government accused of ignoring North's cheating during DMZ guard post demolition

A North Korean guard post seen from Paju, Gyeonggi, in South Korea on Tuesday. [YONHAP]

The former Moon Jae-in administration may have turned a blind eye to the North’s incomplete demolition of its guard posts in the border region as the liberal administration sought more reconciliatory relations with the North.

The Ministry of National Defense has been probing the allegation this week.

“We may request an official investigation if we find signs of abuse of power exercised at the time,” a government insider told the JoongAng Ilbo on Monday.

The two Koreas destroyed 10 guard posts each in the border region as part of a military agreement signed during the third inter-Korean summit in 2018. The idea was to set up a buffer zone between the two Koreas to reduce the chance of accidental clashes.

Both sides cross-inspected the guard posts to ensure they were properly destroyed.

However, some South Korean military officials recently accused the Moon government of shutting down their reports on the North's incomplete demolition of its guard posts. These officials allegedly reported signs the North did not completely demolish the 10 guard posts and preserved their underground tunnels.

“We will be investigating whether the military reports were ignored [by the administration],” a military insider told the JoongAng Ilbo.
According to the reports, some of these tunnels, placed 10 meters (32.8 feet) below ground, stretch some 100 meters and connect living spaces and weapons storage.

These officials alleged that due to the North’s refusal, they couldn’t bring ground-penetrating radar systems to inspect whether these underground systems were destroyed.

The defense minister himself also raised the allegation.

“North Korea appears to have left the rest of the interior underground untouched,” Defense Minister Shin Won-shik told Yonhap News last week. “The fact that [troops and equipment] were immediately deployed to the guard posts implies that they had basic facilities ready underground. We should have seen signs for [underground] construction at the posts if everything had been destroyed, but there were none.”

The North since December has been rebuilding its guard posts after the two Koreas walked back their inter-Korean military agreement of 2018, according to the South Korean military.

In protest of the North’s launch of a spy satellite into space in November last year, South Korea partially suspended the military deal, to which North Korea responded with a full suspension.

On Monday, the People Power Party urged investigators to get to the bottom of the allegations.

“This is what happens when we lower our security, taking promises by the North at face value,” said Yun Jae-ok, floor leader of the conservative party, in a party meeting on Monday.

Members of the liberal Democratic Party accused the Yoon Suk Yeol government of trying to score a political win out of past events.

“By bringing up something that happened five years ago, this current government must be trying to use it as a political agenda to suspend the inter-Korean military agreement completely,” Kim Do-gyun, a defense spokesman for the Democratic Party, told the JoongAng Ilbo.

BY BY LEE KEUN-PYUNG, ESTHER CHUNG [chung.juhee@joongang.co.kr]