By Ankit Panda
North Korea fired coastal artillery towards a South Korean naval ship off the coast of Yeonpyeong Island.
Continuing a trend of provocations that began earlier this year, North Korea fired artillery towards a South Korean patrol boat on Thursday. The patrol boat was not hit and returned fire, but the encounter echoed the much more serious 2010 incident when the North Korean military sank the ROK Navy’s Cheonan, killing 46 sailors.
According to the South Korean Defense Ministry, the incident took place off the shore of Yeonpyeong Island, one of South Korea’s northernmost administered islands. Yeonpyeong Island itself was bombarded by North Korea in 2010, killing two South Korean soldiers and two civilians.
“A shell fell near our boat at around 6:00 p.m., 14 kilometers southwest of Yeonpyeong Island and south of the Northern Limit Line,” notes one South Korean military official. The shells were fired from the north of the Northern Limit Line (NLL) — the disputed maritime boundary between the two Koreas.
Read the full story at The Diplomat
Logging you in...