Yeonpyeong, a small island just 12km from the North Korean coast, still bears the scars of a deadly 2010 artillery attack but residents there hope the latest meeting between the two sides can bring them a sense of security
Eight years on from the surprise attack the South Korean island’s unhealed scars are still visible in the form of shattered houses, broken furniture and burnt tree stumps.
In November 2010, residents of Yeonpyeong, an island in the Yellow Sea that lies just 12km (seven miles) from the North Korean coast, ran out of their houses screaming in terror as an artillery barrage opened up without warning, killing four people – two of them civilians – and wounding 60.
Next to the shattered concrete walls and the debris piled outside the skeletal remains of buildings in Yeonpyeong-ri, a two-storey “security education centre” has been built to commemorate the events.
But despite its history and the tremendous tension that living so close to the North generates, the islanders were keen to give peace another chance.
Hopes that the two sides could be reconciled were rising ahead of Tuesday’s meeting between the leaders of the two Koreas in Pyongyang, where plans to ease military tensions were expected to be up for discussion.
Last week, Chung Eui-yong, the South Korean national security adviser, told the Seoul Defence Dialogue that the two militaries were discussing ways to demilitarise disputed border areas.
Chung said that they had discussed ways to transform the disputed western sea border – including Yeonpyeong – as a “peace zone” to ease maritime military tensions.
Yet, a South Korean parliamentary source told the South China Morning Post that whilst negotiations about the demilitarised zone were going well, the two Koreas are still largely divided on the issue of establishing a Yellow Sea Peace Zone.
“Establishing a peace zone is a matter of survival to us,” Park Chun-geun, a fisherman on the island, said.
