SOUTH KOREA: DISCOVERY OF ALLEGED NORTH KOREAN "ATTACK TUNNEL" IN DEMILITARISED ZONE INCREASES TENSION BETWEEN THE DIVIDED STATES.

Record ID: 1063948

  • Title: SOUTH KOREA: DISCOVERY OF ALLEGED NORTH KOREAN "ATTACK TUNNEL" IN DEMILITARISED ZONE INCREASES TENSION BETWEEN THE DIVIDED STATES.
  • Date: 27th November 1974
  • Summary: 1. GV Meeting building in Panmunjom 0.06 2. SV INT N. Korean leader, Kim Pumg Sup speaking across table to General Morgan, head of UN team 0.13 3. SV N. Korean soldier holds up M-16 weapons 0.16 4. SCU General Morgan speaking 0.24 5. CU PAN Captured equipment on display, including rubber dinghy, rifles, hand grenades, wire, shovels, picks & trowels (4 shots) 0.37 6. GV Section of tunnel 0.42 7. GV ZOOM INT CU Map 0.48 8. GV ZOOM OUT & PAN ACROOS FROM Border and valley towards tunnel entrance 1.10 9. SV TILT DOWN Entrance TO tunnel 1.17 10. GV Tunnel 1.22 11. SV TILT UP Construction in tunnel 1.26 12. SCU Date in English on wall TILT DOWN TO tunnel 1.31 13. SV TILT DOWN Soldiers on railway trolley 1.39 14. MV TRAVEL SHOT THROUGH tunnel 1.44 15. MV PAN Damaged section of entrance to tunnel 1.49 16. SV & MV Troops at entrance (3 shots) 2.00 17. MV Barbed wire 2.03 18. MV PAN Troops searching 2.11 Initials BB/0149 BL/AW-DW/BB/0207 Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved
  • Embargoed: 11th December 1974 12:00
  • Keywords:
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  • Location: DEMILITARISED ZONE & PANMUNJOM, SOUTH KOREA
  • Country: South Korea
  • Reuters ID: LVA8ZCG9TIAV3NVP76JPU91BCPE6
  • Story Text:The discovery of an alleged North Korean "attack tunnel" in the demilitarised zone between North and South Korea has increased tension between the divided states.

    The tunnel was discovered on 15 November, running from the northern side of the demilitarised zone into the southern section. Three feet wide and four feet high, the tunnel was reinforced with concrete walls and equipped with electric lighting. The South Koreans claimed it was designed to allow 7,000 troops an hour to pass into the southern sector of the demilitarised zone.

    While investigating the tunnel -- discovered initially when air holes were sighted -- South Korean soldiers and United Nations Civil Police were fired upon by Northern troops. Five days later, a United States Navy Commander was killed by an apparently booby-trapped stock of explosives in the tunnel.

    The American-led United Nations command has accused North Korea of building the tunnel, claiming it constituted a major breach of the Military Armistice Agreement which separated the North and South in 1953.

    The charge -- made at a meeting of the U.N. Military Armistice Commission at the town of panmunjom near the demilitarised zone -- was rejected by the North Korean delegate, who claimed the tunnel was "one of the politically motivated tricks" of South Korea.

    The tunnel runs for about 1200 yards (1097 metres) and is equipped with narrow gauge railway tracks allegedly capable of moving whole regiments of troops. The United Nations Civil Police claimed that tools and equipment at the tunnel site indicated that the Northern Koreans had evacuated the area in a hurry.
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