North Korea warns of war after exchange of fire with South

[webfact]

NKorea warns of war after exchange of fire with South
By ERIC TALMADGE and HYUNG-JIN KIM

PYONGYANG, North Korea (AP) — North Korea on Friday declared its frontline troops in a "a quasi-state of war" and warned of military operations a day after the rival Koreas exchanged fire across the world's most heavily armed border.

The North has made similar bombastic claims before and the huge numbers of soldiers and military equipment stationed along the Koreas' tense border mean the area is always essentially in a "quasi-state of war." Still, the declaration, following South Korea's firing of dozens of shells across the border after the North lobbed several rounds at a South Korean town, signals a worrying development.

The North's official Korean Central News Agency reported Friday that leader Kim Jong Un ordered at an emergency military meeting that his troops "be fully ready for any military operations at any time from 5 p.m. (0730 GMT) Friday."

The report said that "military commanders were urgently dispatched for operations to attack South Korean psychological warfare facilities if the South doesn't stop operating them."

Seoul said the North fired Thursday across the Demilitarized Zone to back up an earlier threat to attack South Korean border loudspeakers that, after a lull of 11 years, have started broadcasting anti-Pyongyang propaganda. North Korea, which denies firing at the South, later said the South Korean shells landed near four military posts but caused no injuries. No one was reported injured in the South, either, though hundreds were evacuated from frontline towns.

The loudspeaker broadcasts began after South Korea accused the North of planting land mines that maimed two South Korean soldiers earlier this month.

Authoritarian North Korea, which has also restarted its own propaganda broadcasts, is extremely sensitive to any criticism of the government run by leader Kim Jong Un, whose family has ruled since the North was founded in 1948. Pyongyang worries that the critical broadcasts could weaken Kim's grip on absolute power, analysts say.

North Korea first fired a single round believed to be from an anti- aircraft gun, which landed in a South Korean border town on Thursday afternoon, Seoul said. About 20 minutes later, several more artillery shells fell on the southern side of the Demilitarized Zone dividing the two Koreas. South Korea responded with dozens of 155-milimeter artillery rounds, according to South Korean defense officials.

The exchange stopped there, but the North's army later warned in a message that it would take further military action if South Korea didn't pull down the loudspeakers.

South Korea raised its military readiness to its highest level. Joint Chiefs of Staff spokesman Jeon Ha-kyu told a televised news conference that South Korea is ready to repel any additional provocation. Defense officials said South Korea will continue the loudspeaker broadcasts despite the threats.

The artillery exchange comes during another point of tensions between the Koreas: annual U.S.-South Korean military drills that North Korea calls an invasion rehearsal. Seoul and Washington say the drills are defensive in nature.

South Korean President Park Geun-hye convened an emergency National Security Council meeting and ordered South Korea's military to "resolutely" deal with any provocation by North Korea.

In Washington, State Department spokesman John Kirby said the U.S. was worried by the North's firing into South Korea and closely monitoring the situation.

About 80 residents in the South Korean town where the shell fell, Yeoncheon, were evacuated to underground bunkers, and authorities urged other residents to evacuate, a Yeoncheon official said, requesting anonymity because he wasn't authorized to speak to the media. South Korea's Yonhap news agency reported that a total of about 2,000 residents along the border were evacuated.

While the Koreas regularly exchange hostile rhetoric, it is also not unusual for fighting to occasionally erupt. Last October, North Korean troops opened fire at areas in Yeoncheon, after South Korean activists launched balloons there that carried propaganda leaflets across the border. South Korea returned fire, but no casualties were reported. Later in October, border guards from the two Koreas again exchanged gunfire along the border, without any casualties.

Before that, the Koreas tangled in a deadly artillery exchange in 2010, when North Korean artillery strikes on a South Korean border island killed four South Koreans. Earlier in 2010, an alleged North Korean torpedo attack killed 46 South Korean sailors.

North Korea's army said recently in a statement that the South Korean propaganda broadcasts were a declaration of war and that if they were not immediately stopped "an all-out military action of justice" would ensue. Pyongyang says that Seoul fabricated its evidence on the land mines and demanded video proof.

South Korea has said the two soldiers wounded from the mine explosions were on a routine patrol in the southern part of the DMZ that separates the two Koreas. One soldier lost both legs and the other one leg.

The Koreas' mine-strewn DMZ is a legacy of the 1950-53 Korean War, which ended with an armistice, not a peace treaty, leaving the Korean Peninsula still technically in a state of war.
___

Kim reported from Seoul. AP writer Foster Klug in Seoul contributed to this story.


-- (c) Associated Press 2015-08-21

[Pomthai]

Perhaps its time for Kim to get a hair cut again and he wants some attention.

[z42]

Nothing new then. When China washes its hands of them they're going to fold anyways. Just empty rhetoric again

[webfact]

North Korea orders troops on war footing after exchanging fire with South

(BBC) North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has ordered his frontline troops to be on a war footing, state media says, after an exchange of fire with the South across their heavily fortified border.

The KCNA report said Mr Kim declared a "semi-state of war" at an emergency meeting late Thursday.

It threatened action unless Seoul ends its anti-Pyongyang border broadcasts.

The North often uses fierce rhetoric when tensions rise and it has made similar declarations before.

The BBC's South Korea correspondent Steve Evans says that although this ritual of aggression often sees such language escalate to the firing of ammunition, this time the rhetoric is fiercer and and artillery shells are now in use.

Full story: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-34013475


-- BBC 2015-08-21

[Seastallion]

The propaganda has been accumulating in Western media for months. A sure sign that something will happen, but not initiated by NK, or at least not without Sk/US provocation.

[craigt3365]

The propaganda has been accumulating in Western media for months. A sure sign that something will happen, but not initiated by NK, or at least not without Sk/US provocation.

Propaganda? You've got to be kidding...I believe this started with a mine blast recently, followed by loudspeakers, then a shell from the north.

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2015/08/north-korea-state-media-army-mobilised-150821003337584.html

Hardly propaganda.

[Scott]

Off-topic post removed.

[slapout]

The wannabe bully is outclassed even before he opens his mouth He must be into the booze bottle again while down in his bomb shelter. He really needs a nanny to look after him and a educated intelligent diplomate to speak to the press and other media that pass info to the rest of the world.

[Usernames]

Maybe North Korea's new ally and best friend, Thailand, can step in and help matters???

[Steely Dan]

The propaganda has been accumulating in Western media for months. A sure sign that something will happen, but not initiated by NK, or at least not without Sk/US provocation.

Your unfailing ability to champion the side of evil has turned you into a self-caricature, quite an achievement even for the loopy left.

[Baerboxer]

The propaganda has been accumulating in Western media for months. A sure sign that something will happen, but not initiated by NK, or at least not without Sk/US provocation.

Your unfailing ability to champion the side of evil has turned you into a self-caricature, quite an achievement even for the loopy left.

Wonder if he'll claim its The Mossad behind this, hoping to divert attention from Israeli war crimes in Palestine and profit from arms deals? Possibly aided by those wicked CIA people intent on provoking the peace loving North Korean communist utopia into confrontation by playing loudspeakers which their hereditary dictator doesn't like.

The Western media and South Koreans are simply the lackeys of this fiendish American plot orchestrated by their masters in Tel Aviv.

Edited August 21, 2015 by Baerboxer

[klauskunkel]

North Korea warns of war after exchange of fire with South

no need to warn, just surprise us, you daring, powerful, supreme Overlord of North Korea...no???, don't want to surprise us?,... thought so, you meek. potbellied, deflated dummy.

Edited August 21, 2015 by klauskunkel

[BuaBS]

Can't blame NK for this ..... noisy neighbours are the worst.

[willyumiii]

"The exchange stopped there, but the North's army later warned in a message that it would take further military action if South Korea didn't pull down the loudspeakers."

Hummm...wondering if that would work on my neighbors here in Thailand?

[willyumiii]

Same old, same old..

The north makes threats, the U.S. will give them some sort of "Aid package" to calm them down.

The aid package will be sucked up by the government so they can make a profit on it..

All is good, until next time..

Meanwhile, the people starve.

Isn't this one of Thailand's good friends now?

Maybe Thailand can send some old rotten rice to calm them down?

[pattayasnowman]

Turn off the loudspeakers duh

[shaurene]

Maybe North Korea's new ally and best friend, Thailand, can step in and help matters???

Where did you get that information from. Can you supply any information like facts.

[Steely Dan]

"The exchange stopped there, but the North's army later warned in a message that it would take further military action if South Korea didn't pull down the loudspeakers."

Hummm...wondering if that would work on my neighbors here in Thailand?

Bang and Olufsen I presume.

[cookee68]

Maybe North Korea's new ally and best friend, Thailand, can step in and help matters???

55555555555555555555555555555

[jesimps]

The propaganda has been accumulating in Western media for months. A sure sign that something will happen, but not initiated by NK, or at least not without Sk/US provocation.

I'm sure the short fat dear leader would let you have a visa for NK. Why don't you begger off there and quit bothering us.

[Oil Baron]

Good to see that their leader has his priorities in order... Huge numbers of people locked up in gulags. No electricity. The general population is in a state of famine. Whole generations of families executed or disappeared just to silence their fanatical despot leader. People resorting to cannibalism in order to survive. It just goes on and on. The more you think about it, there are a lot of similarities with the Pol Pot regime. North Korea's demise can't come soon enough.

Edited August 23, 2015 by Oil Baron

[craigt3365]

Interesting video. Threats of nuclear strikes don't help matters much. All over a loudspeaker? Somebody has a screw loose.

http://edition.cnn.com/2015/08/17/asia/north-korea-propaganda-broadcasts/index.html