Policy

The Republic of Korea (South Korea) has not acceded to the Mine Ban Treaty.

In November 2022, South Korea stated that it “sincerely supports the objectives and purposes of the Ottawa Convention,” but reiterated its long-held position that the “due to the unique security situation on the Korean Peninsula we are currently not a party to the Convention.”[1] In June 2022, an official told the intersessional meetings of the Mine Ban Treaty that “the Republic of Korea, in light of the Korean Peninsula’s unique security situation, is unable to accede to the convention at this juncture,” but said “we nevertheless, support the Ottawa Convention’s objectives and purposes of the convention.”[2]

South Korea participated as an observer at all meetings of the Ottawa Process that created the Mine Ban Treaty, including the Oslo negotiations in September 1997 and the signing conference held in Ottawa in December 1997.

Since 2019, South Korea has participated as an observer at Mine Ban Treaty meetings. Most recently, South Korea attended the Twentieth Meeting of States Parties held in Geneva in November 2022, and the treaty’s intersessional meetings in Geneva in June 2023.

South Korea has abstained from every annual United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) resolution on the Mine Ban Treaty, most recently Resolution 77/63 on 7 December 2022, which called for the universalization and full implementation of the treaty.

The Korean Campaign to Ban Landmines/Peace Sharing Association (KCBL/PSA) advocates for South Korea to join the Mine Ban Treaty and implement its provisions. Since mid-2022, the KCBL has focused on a broader victim compensation act which includes all unexploded ordnance (UXO) victims and is not solely limited to mine victims.[3] The KCBL has also been active in a research committee established by the Ministry of National Defense to draft an act on mine clearance, which was submitted to the National Assembly on 1 November 2022.[4] In 2022, the KCBL facilitated the translation of the International Mine Action Standards (IMAS) into Korean.

South Korea is not party to the Convention on Cluster Munitions. It is party to the Convention on Conventional Weapons (CCW) and its Amended Protocol II on landmines.[5]

Production and transfer

South Korean officials state that there has been no new production of antipersonnel landmines in the country in several years. The Monitor will continue to list South Korea as a producer of antipersonnel mines until it renounces future production of these weapons.

According to the Ministry of National Defense, no defense company in South Korea produced antipersonnel landmines in 2020­–2022.[6] Previously, in August 2019, South Korea informed the ICBL that it had not produced any antipersonnel landmines in the previous five years.[7]

The last known production of antipersonnel landmines in South Korea was in 2011, when a South Korean company, Hanwha Corporation, manufactured 4,000 KM74 antipersonnel mines.[8] In 2007, Hanwha Corporation produced about 10,000 self-destructing antipersonnel mines, as well as an unknown number of Claymore directional fragmentation mines.[9]

In June 2022, South Korea told the Mine Ban Treaty’s intersessional meetings that it maintains a moratorium on the export of antipersonnel mines.[10] Previously, South Korea stated on several occasions that it has “faithfully enforced an indefinite extension of the moratorium on the export of [antipersonnel] mines since 1997.”[11] 

Stockpiling

The precise size and composition of South Korea’s antipersonnel mine stockpile is not publicly known.[12] However, South Korea reported in 2006 and 2008 that its stockpile consisted of 407,800 antipersonnel mines.[13] In the past, the government has stated that it held a stockpile of about two million antipersonnel mines.[14]

Foreign stockpiling

The United States (US) military keeps a substantial number of remotely-delivered, self-destructing antipersonnel landmines in South Korea. In 2005, the South Korean government reported that the US held 40,000 GATOR, 10,000 Volcano, and an unknown number of MOPMS mines.[15]

For many years, the US also stockpiled about 1.1 million M14 and M16 non-self-destructing antipersonnel mines for use in any future war on the Korean Peninsula, with about half the total kept in South Korea and half in the continental US.[16]

Most of the US-owned mines located in South Korea have been part of the more extensive War Reserve Stocks for Allies-Korea (WRSA-K). On 30 December 2005, the US enacted a law authorizing the sale of items in the WRSA-K to South Korea over a three-year period, after which the WRSA-K program would be terminated, which occurred at the end of 2008.[17] In June 2009, the South Korean government told the Monitor, “AP [antipersonnel] mines were not included in the list of items for sale or transfer in the WRSA-K negotiations, and therefore, no AP-mines were bought or obtained.”[18] In June 2011, a Ministry of Foreign Affairs official stated that South Korea safeguards a stockpile of antipersonnel mines belonging to the US military on its territory, as part of the WRSA-K program. These mines are planned to be gradually transferred out of South Korea.[19] In June 2012, a Ministry of Foreign Affairs official stated that the antipersonnel mines were in ammunition storage, within secure areas of the US Forces Korea.[20]

The law ending the WRSA-K program states that any items remaining at the time of termination “shall be removed, disposed of, or both by the [US] Department of Defense.”[21] Moreover, US policy has prohibited the use of non-self-destructing antipersonnel mines in South Korea since 2010. According to documents released under a Freedom of Information Act request by the Monitor in 2013, the WRSA-K stockpile included 480,267 M-14 and 83,319 M-16 antipersonnel mines.[22] In May 2017, South Korean authorities refused to divulge any information regarding WRSA-K stocks of antipersonnel mines.[23]

The US has destroyed all non-self-destructing mines not dedicated for potential use on the Korean Peninsula. As of October 2023, the Monitor could not determine whether the US maintained non-self-destructing antipersonnel mines in South Korea. 

Use

In November 2022, a representative of South Korea told the Twentieth Meeting of States Parties to the Mine Ban Treaty that South Korea had not emplaced any new antipersonnel landmines in several years.[24] In June 2023, the Ministry of National Defense said that South Korea “did not plant any new non-self destructive antipersonnel landmines in new areas during the calendar year 2022.”[25] Previously, in August 2019, South Korea told the ICBL that it had not created any new mined areas since 2000.[26]

In August 2015, two South Korean soldiers were injured by antipersonnel landmines in the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) near the border with North Korea, which South Korean officials said were newly laid mines.[27] An investigation by the US-led United Nations (UN) Command in South Korea attributed responsibility for this use to the North Korean People’s Army.[28]

It is unknown what proportion of mines in the DMZ were laid by US forces when the area was under US control. The Status of Forces Agreement does not allow South Korea to make any claims of the US forces, including records of where US forces may have laid mines.