Kijŏng-dong is one of two villages permitted to remain in the 4 km (2.5 mi) wide DMZ set up under the 1953 armistice during the Korean War;[6][8] the other is the South Korean village of Daeseong-dong,[8] 2.22 kilometers (1.38 mi) away.
History
The Panmunjom flagpole, the world's seventh-tallest, 160 m (525 ft) in height, flying a 270 kg (595 lb) flag of North Korea over Kijŏng-dong, near Panmunjom.View of Kijŏng-dong
The North Korean government says the village contains a 200-family collective farm, serviced by a child care center, kindergarten, primary and secondary schools, and a hospital.[9] However, the South says the town is an uninhabited village built in the 1950s in a propaganda effort to encourage South Korean defection and to house the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) soldiers manning the network of artillery positions, fortifications and underground marshalling bunkers that surround the border zone.[2][3][10][11]
The village features a number of brightly painted, poured-concrete multi-story buildings and apartments, many apparently wired for electricity. The town was oriented so that the bright blue roofs and multi-colored sides of the buildings next to the massive DPRK flag would be the most distinguishing features when viewed from across the border. Scrutiny with modern telescopic lenses, however, has led to the conclusion that the buildings are concrete shells lacking window glass or even interior rooms,[10][12] with building lights turned on and off at set times and empty sidewalks swept by caretakers in an effort to preserve the illusion of activity.[13]
The village is surrounded by extensive cultivated fields, clearly visible to visitors to the North Korean side of the DMZ.
The North Korean government responded by building an even taller one, the Panmunjom flagpole, at 160 m (525 ft) with a 270 kg (595 lb) flag of North Korea in Kijŏng-dong, 1.2 km (0.7 mi) across the demarcation line from South Korea (37°56′42.99″N126°39′18.78″E / 37.9452750°N 126.6552167°E / 37.9452750; 126.6552167), in what some have called the "flagpole war". For over a decade, the flagpole was the tallest in the world.[10] In 2010, the flagpole became the second-tallest flagpole in the world at the time, after the National Flag Square in Baku, Azerbaijan at 162 m (531 ft).[10][14][15] It is now the seventh-tallest flagpole in the world, and the tallest supported one.
Massive loudspeakers mounted on several of the buildings deliver DPRK propaganda broadcasts directed towards the South.[10] Originally, the content extolled the North's virtues in great detail and urged disgruntled soldiers and farmers simply to walk across the border to be received as brothers.[16] As its value in inducing defections diminished over time, particularly as South Korea caught up with the North economically in the 1960s and 1970s,[17] the content was switched to condemnatory anti-Western speeches, agitprop operas, and patriotic marching music for up to 20 hours a day.[16] For a period from 2004 to 2016, both North and South agreed to end their loudspeaker broadcasts at each other.[18] The broadcasts resumed after escalating tensions as a result of the January 2016 nuclear test.[19] On 23 April 2018, both North and South Korea officially cancelled their border propaganda broadcasts.[20]
Notes
^P'yŏnghwa-ri belonged to P'anmun-gun (Korean: 판문군; Hancha: 板門郡) until the creation of Kaesong Industrial Region in November 2002, when P'anmun-gun was dissolved and its territory divided among Kaesong, Changp'ung-gun and Kaep'ung-gun, P'yŏnghwa-ri joined Kaesong. in April 2020, P'yŏnghwa-ri incorporated with Panmun-guyok.
^ abcTran, Mark (2008-06-06). "Travelling into Korea's demilitarised zone: Run DMZ". The Guardian. London. Retrieved 2009-07-05. Kijong-dong was built specially in the north area of DMZ. Designed to show the superiority of the communist model, it has no residents except soldiers.
