South Korea’s Defense Ministry on Wednesday unveiled a sweeping rollback of regulations along the heavily fortified border with North Korea, pledging to move a decades-old military buffer and open hundreds of square kilometers of land for civilian use.

The ministry in a press release and briefing led by Defense Minister Ahn Gyu-back said it would relocate the Civilian Control Line (CCL) to an average of about 6 kilometers south of the Military Demarcation Line (MDL), down from an average of about 8 km. The MDL is the de facto inter-Korean border running through the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ).

The move will