South Korean cemetery keeps Cold War alive

By Jon Herskovitz

PAJU, South Korea (Reuters) - There is no resting in peace at South Korea's "Enemy Cemetery".

On a quiet hill, just south of the heavily armed border that divides the Korean peninsula, wooden grave markers with fading white paint are aligned in neat rows above bodies no one wants to claim at plots few dare visit.

In black ink splattered with mud, the Korean word for "Anonymous" marks almost all of the burial mounds for nearly 550 North Korean and Chinese soldiers and spies.

"The graves are pointed to the North. They are facing home," said South Korean First Lieutenant Choi Won-joon, who served as a military guide to the graveyard.

The cemetery, which opened in 1996, is a reminder of the lingering hostilities between the Cold War foes.

Last month, the Defence Ministry said the cemetery was nearing capacity as hundreds of bodies of North Korean soldiers killed in the 1950-53 Korean war have been dug up in recent years and buried in the graveyard. North Korea refuses to take back the bodies.

"As far as the North Koreas are concerned, the entire peninsula is rightfully theirs. They are still in Korean soil as far as they are concerned and they are looking at unification as just a matter of time," said Brian Meyers, a specialist in North Korea's state ideology at Dongseo University in Busan.

The cemetery also contains the remains of North Korean commandoes sent on missions to kill. If the North claimed these bodies, it would also have to accept responsibility and apologise for the missions that Pyongyang has so far disavowed.