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[2018 DMZ Peace Train Music Festival]
SEOUL -- Glen Matlock, a 61-year-old member of British punk rock band Sex Pistols, will perform with South Korean rock bands at a concert near the heavily armed inter-Korean border this week to blare a message of peace to the two Koreas, which have been locked in bitter confrontation for more than six decades.
The demilitarized zone (DMZ) is a four-kilometer-wide strip of land that has divided the Korean peninsula since an armistice accord ended the 1950-53 Korean War.
For its second and third day schedule at the weekend, the annual "2018 DMZ Peace Train Music Festival" will hold inaugural events at a place in the northern border county of Cheorwon, about 17 kilometers away from the DMZ, within the range of North Korea's artillery fire.
Matlock will perform on stage with Crying Nut, a South Korean punk rock band. On the first day of the festival on Friday, a peace conference and showcase will be held in Seoul.
"This festival started out initially as a kind of a protest or a way of drawing attention to what is going on in the DMZ zone," Matlock, a bass player, said at a pre-event press conference in Seoul on Thursday. "It's making a start," he said.
Referring to a cross-border thaw created by an inter-Korean summit in April, the guitarist said the peace concert was very timely as the whole world is "rooting" for more improvements to be made in inter-Korean relations or the border coming down.
Initially, organizers had planned to invite a North Korean art troupe, but they shelved their plan after U.S and North Korean leaders held a summit in Singapore. "The government has asked us to refrain from contacting North Koreans," one organizer said.
South Koreans are barred from making unauthorized contact with North Koreans, and violators can be jailed under a security law.
reporter
Park Sae-jin
swatchsjp@ajunews.com
