The Gyeonggi provincial city of Paju, near the inter-Korean border, will start accepting on Friday advance online reservations for a "peace tour" program at the Demilitarized Zone(DMZ).

The tour, which includes visits to the Third Tunnel, built for infiltration by North Korea, and the Dora Observatory, has until now been available only through on-site ticket purchases as it requires procedures for entry through the Civilian Control Line(CCL).

Both individual and group tour reservations can be made on the program's online reservation website, https://dmz.paju.go.kr.

The city government plans to enhance the online booking system and start full-scale operations starting this fall.

From September, the system will offer discounts or exemptions on online advance ticket bookings, multilingual services and accept overseas payment for international visitors.