North Korea fortifies border: Symbolic roadblocks to the South
North Korea has created 36-foot earthen mounds, completely blocking roads leading to South Korea. Previously, these roads were destroyed. This action signals another of Pyongyang's efforts to sever all ties with South Korea.
On 15th October, North Korea demolished parts of the Gyeongui and Donghae roads, which run north of the inter-Korean border. In doing so, it continued its previous announcements of cutting off all road and rail connections with South Korea.
The South Korean agency Yonhap reports that about 300–400 people worked on the northern sections of the Gyeongui and Donghae routes, engaged in piling up earthen mounds in the region of the destroyed roads.
At the southern ends of these mounds, Kim Jong Un's country constructed concrete anti-tank trenches, cutting across the remains of the roads. According to South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS), constructing these barriers is more of a symbolic gesture without any real strategic significance.
For the North Korean military, these are not suitable barriers in wartime. It appears to be just for show to mark this as their territory, a JCS official told reporters.
North Korea destroyed roads, now it has dug trenches
According to the Yonhap agency, the anti-tank trench built by North Korea along the Donghae line is 525 feet long and five meters deep. Meanwhile, the trench along the Gyeongui line is shallower, at three meters.
North Korea is gradually erasing traces of aspirations for Korean reunification and reconciliation, especially after its leader described relations between the two Koreas as ties between "two hostile states" during a party meeting late last year.
As reported by the Yonhap agency, even before last month's explosions, the North had removed street lamps and installed mines on its side of the Gyeongui and Donghae roads. Additionally, it deployed soldiers to erect symbolic anti-tank barriers on the northern side of the Demilitarized Zone, which separates the two states.
