South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said it broadcast warnings and fired warning shots to repel a North Korean merchant vessel that crossed the Northern Limit Line (NLL), the de facto sea boundary, at approximately 3:40 am local time on Monday, Aljazeera reported.
North Korea’s military said it fired 10 rounds of artillery warning shots toward its territorial waters, where “naval enemy movement was detected”. It accused a South Korean naval ship of intruding into North Korean waters on the pretext of cracking down on an unidentified ship.
“We ordered initial countermeasures to strongly expel the enemy warship by firing 10 shells of multiple rocket launchers near the waters where the enemy movement occurred,” the North Korean People’s Army said in a statement carried by the official KCNA news agency.
There were no reports of clashes, but the poorly marked sea boundary off the Korean Peninsula’s west coast is a source of long-running animosities between the two countries.
In recent weeks, North Korea has launched short-range ballistic missiles and hundreds of artillery rounds off its east and west coasts on several occasions in protest over its southern neighbor’s military activities.
South Korea’s troops kicked off their annual Hoguk defense drills last week, designed to run until October 28, and boost their own and combined ability with the United States to counter possible threats.
Pyongyang has reacted angrily to the exercises, calling them provocations and threatening countermeasures. Seoul and Washington say their exercises are defensive and aimed at deterring North Korea.
RHM/PR
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