REMOVAL BEGINS OF LANDMINES IN KOREAN DMZ

North and South Korean troops began removing some of the landmines planted at their heavily fortified border on Monday, Seoul officials said, in the first implementation of recent agreements aimed at easing their decades-long military standoff.

The de-mining comes amid resumed diplomacy over North Korea’s nuclear weapons program after weeks of stalemated negotiations. U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is to visit Pyongyang, North Korea’s capital, this month to try to set up a second summit between President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

On Monday, South Korean army engineers with demining equipment were deployed to the border village of Panmunjom and another front line area called “Arrow Head Hill” where the Koreas plan their first joint searches for soldiers killed during the 1950-53 Korean War.

The troops began removing mines on the southern part of the two sites. Later Monday, the South Korean military detected North Korean soldiers engaged in what it believed was de-mining on the northern part of the sites.

At Arrow Head Hill, where some of the fiercest battles occurred during the Korean War, Seoul officials believe there are remains of about 300 South Korean and UN forces, along with an unspecified number of Chinese and North Korean remains.