SEOUL: North and South Korea exchanged warning shots off the west coast on Monday, accusing each other of breaching their maritime borders amid heightened military tension.
The South’s Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said it broadcast warnings and fired warning shots to see off a North Korean merchant vessel that crossed the Northern Limit Line (NLL), the de facto sea boundary, at around 3.40 am (2.40am Singapore time).
The North’s military said it fired 10 rocket artillery rounds after a South Korean navy ship violated the NLL and fired warning shots “on the pretext of tracking down an unidentified ship,” according to state media.
“We ordered initial countermeasures to strongly expel the enemy warship,” a spokesperson for the General Staff of the North’s Korean People’s Army said, according to the official KCNA news agency.
The JCS said it had conducted a “normal operation” over the border intrusion, and called the North’s move a violation of a 2018 bilateral military pact banning “hostile acts” in the border areas.
“We once again urge North Korea to immediately cease consistent provocations and accusations which harm the peace and stability of the Korean peninsula as well as the international community,” the JCS said in a statement.