SEOUL: North Korea conducted live-fire drills on its western coast, Seoul’s military said on Sunday, the third consecutive day of military exercises near its contested maritime border with the South.

Seoul’s military said that North Korea had “conducted artillery fire with over 90 rounds north of Yeonpyeong island from 1600 to 1710 (0400 to 0510 GMT) today”.

They accused the North of “repeated artillery fire” within a buffer zone created in 2018 under a now-defunct tension-reducing deal, saying the bombardment posed “a threat to the peace on the Korean Peninsula.”

North Korea’s military said it had carried out “maritime live-fire training” with 88 rounds of artillery but said the drills were “directionally unrelated” to the maritime border.

The exercises “did not pose any intentional threat” to South Korea and were part of the North’s “normal training system of our military,” it said in a statement carried by the official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).

No North Korean artillery shells fell south of the Northern Limit Line, the de facto maritime border in the Yellow Sea, and no casualties were reported, according to the Yonhap news agency.

Published in Dawn, January 8th, 2024