Both North and South Korea exchanged warning shots near their disputed western sea boundary on Monday, their militaries stated, amid heightened tensions over North Korea’s latest barrage of weapons assessments.
South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff stated in an announcement that its navy fired warning shots to repel a North Korean service provider ship that it says violated the sea boundary early Monday.
North Korea’s army stated it responded by firing 10 rounds of artillery shells as a warning to South Korea. It accused a South Korean navy ship of intruding into North Korean waters.
The poorly marked sea boundary off the Korean Peninsula’s west coast is a supply of long-running animosities between the Koreas. It’s a scene of a number of bloody inter-Korean naval skirmishes and violence in recent times, together with two assaults in 2010 that killed 50 South Koreans.
In latest weeks, North Korea has carried out a string of weapons assessments in response to what it calls provocative army drills between South Korea and the United States. Since Sept. 25, North Korea has fired 15 missiles and a whole bunch of artillery shells towards the sea.
Seoul and Washington routinely conduct army drills to take care of their readiness towards potential North Korean aggressions. The allies say their drills are defensive in nature, however North Korea views them as an invasion rehearsal.
South Korea’s army is performing annual discipline workout routines, set to finish this Friday. This yr’s drills contain an unspecified variety of U.S. troops.
Some consultants say North Korea’s latest weapons assessments are additionally designed to bolster its arsenals to spice up its leverage in future negotiations with rivals.