At the "hot spot"

Sweden, along with Switzerland has had a presence in the demilitarized zone separating the north and south since 1953. On Wednesday, Radio Sweden's Dave Russell asked Commander Mats Fågelmark to describe the current situation on the ground -- he's the Deputy Head of the Swedish Delegation of the Neutral Nations Supervising Commission in Korea.

It's eye of the storm because here in Pamenyan the troops are always on high alert, so they are in that state of readiness already and nothing else has happened, just the so-called explosion.

Has tension increased at all?

We work in the area called Joint Security Area, it's a rather small area that is shared by the North Koreans and the South Koreans and it is some kind of mutual understanding that they will do nothing here. So it's very calm and stable just here in the joint security area.

And South Koreans, what do they say?

It was expected that they should blow that nuclear bomb so no one is surprised at all.

In your opinion, how do you see this going in the next few days, weeks and months?

That was a very difficult question. But I hope that nothing happens that we will solve this on the political level.

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