A wind-fed mountain fire that broke out in North Korea and spread into the South Korean sector of the inter-Korean border Saturday was largely brought
under control, military authorities said.
   
The blaze, first spotted in the northern side of the 4-kilometer-wide Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) at around 4:40 a.m., quickly spread past the eastern sector of the 248-kilometer border and reached within 100 meters of the nearest South Korean guard posts inside the buffer zone, they said.
  
Two forest service helicopters were dispatched at around 6:20 p.m. as some embers crossed the 2-meter-high barbed-wire fence set up by South Korea on its side of the border to fend off North Korean infiltrators, they added.
   
About 18 hours after the fire was spotted, South Korean soldiers, assisted by civilian firefighters, succeeded in containing it within the buffer zone, military officials said, adding that no injuries or property damage were reported.    

"While the fire let up, additional workforces will be dispatched until it is completely put out," said one military official involved in the firefighting in Goseong, a town on the nation's east coast.
   
About 80 civilian firefighters and nine fire trucks were on standby to provide additional assistance if needed, said Goseong officials.    

The size of burnt areas is estimated to have reached a radius of some 13 kilometers, but the exact damage has not been confirmed, they said.
   
The Korean DMZ, the world's most heavily armed, runs the width of the Korean Peninsula roughly along the 38th parallel. It is guarded by more than 2 million troops on both sides.    

Bush and mountain fires often break out along the border, and one side accuses the other of intentionally starting them as part of military tactics.
   
Tension along the Korean border has spiked significantly in recent weeks as the two Koreas put their troops on full alert. North Korea has repeated threatened to start war in anger over new U.N. sanctions for its latest nuclear test in February and South Korea-U.S. joint military exercises. (Yonhap News)