At Panmunjom truce village, it's a quiet life for Swedish and Swiss soldiers
For the five Swedes and five Swiss who are Panmunjom's only full-time residents, the serene surroundings give no hint of border tensions
Surrounded by the minefields, artillery emplacements and fortifications of the world's most militarised frontier, the truce village of Panmunjom squats in the very centre of Korea's Demilitarised Zone.
Its three blue-painted huts straddling the border, beyond which South and North Korean sentries stand glaring at each other, are international news icons, illustrating reports whenever tensions flare on the flashpoint peninsula.
To its south, the US-South Korean Camp Bonifas - with bunkers guarding its baseball diamond and its one-hole golf course surrounded on three sides by minefields - sports a sign proudly emblazoned "In Front Of Them All". But in front of Bonifas, Panmunjom's only permanent residents - five Swedish and five Swiss soldiers of the Neutral Nations Supervisory Commission, or NNSC - say they feel little threat, even though they live inside the DMZ.
The Swedish-Swiss camp adjacent to the truce village is serene: clutches of bungalows in quiet woodland, complete with dining facilities, two cosy bars and a gym.
"With all the birdsong and nice weather, it's very easy to forget that 50 metres away is a fence, and two kilometres north, you have 13,200 artillery pieces and a forward-deployed army," said Swedish General Berndt Grundevik.
The NNSC does maintain a bunker, filled with emergency rations and medical gear. But though it runs drills to evacuate "at a minute's notice", it has never been used. No NNSC member is armed; one says he does not even lock his bungalow at night.
