A former special advisor to the United Nations Command says that the Northern Limit Line (NLL) in the West Sea has no basis in the Korea armistice treaty.

In an interview with U.S. radio broadcaster Voice of America, Lee Mun-hang said that the U.N. Command (UNC) unilaterally drew the NLL and did not notify North Korea.

He said that during the cease-fire talks in 1953, the United Nations and North Korea could not reach an agreement on a sea border because the two sides had widely differing opinions, but the UNC went ahead and drew the line to mark the limit of South Korean naval operations.

Lee went on to say that, although he attended the Military Armistice Commission meetings from 1966 to 1994 for 28 years, the NLL issue never came up again, and even when a North Korean vessel crossed the NLL, it was not considered a violation of the armistice treaty.

He added that the it would be best that the two Koreas decide on a new sea border in accordance with the South-North Basic Agreement of 1992 and designate mutual fishing zones to avoid further clashes in the West Sea.