Seoul–Pyongyang hotline

Most of them run through the Panmunjom Joint Security Area (JSA) within the Korean Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) and are maintained by the Red Cross.

Five of them are used for daily communications, 21 for negotiations between the two countries, two for handling air traffic, two for sea transport and three for economic co-operation.

[2] The first hotline was established in September 1971 to allow the North and South Korean Red Crosses to negotiate.

Further lines were agreed to, in principle, at the 4 July 1972 Joint Communiqué between the two states[3] and began operation on 18 August 1972.

[9] In September 2021, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un offered to restore the Inter-Korean hotline after it severed the connection in early August 2021, in protest against joint South Korea-U.S. military exercises.

In the background: the South Korean Freedom House in the Joint Security Area (JSA), where the South Korean terminal of the Red Cross border hotline is located
The North Korean Panmungak building in the Joint Security Area (JSA), where the North Korean terminal of the Red Cross border hotline is located