Asia

Asia

South Korea May Delay Drill Amid North Korean Threats

18 December 2010 22:06 (UTC +04:00)

Baku-APA. South Korea said it may not be able to conduct an artillery drill this weekend because of bad weather, even as North Korea warned it would retaliate if the exercise took place, APA reports quoting businessweek.com website.
A spokesman at South Koreaâ€™s Joint Chiefs of Staff, who declined to be named because of military policy, made the comments by telephone today in Seoul. South Korea was planning to conduct the exercises between today and Dec. 21, a spokesman at the Joint Chiefs said yesterday.
Shelling by South Korea â€œwould make it impossible to prevent the situation on the Korean Peninsula from exploding,â€ North Koreaâ€™s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement distributed today via the state-run Korean Central News Agency. North Korea has already said it would â€œmete out decisive and merciless punishmentâ€ if its sovereignty is violated, and it â€œdoes not make an empty talk,â€ according to the statement.
A barrage of shells from North Korea hit South Koreaâ€™s Yeonpyeong Island last month killing two civilians and two soldiers, setting 30 houses ablaze and scorching 25 hectares (62 acres) of land. North Koreaâ€™s firing on Yeonpyeong was the first shelling of South Korean soil since the 1950-1953 war.
There is cloud and a chance of rain tomorrow in Incheon, the closest major South Korea port to Yeonpyeong Island, the Korea Meteorological Administration said on its website today.
â€˜Perfectly Legitimateâ€™
U.S. State Department spokesman Philip J. Crowley said the latest planned drill â€œis a perfectly legitimate stepâ€ by South Korea. About 20 U.S. military personnel will be sent to the island to assist, said a South Korean defense ministry official who declined to be named, citing government policy.
China said itâ€™s â€œdeeply concernedâ€ about the â€œextremely precariousâ€ situation on the peninsula, Xinhua News Agency reported today, citing Vice Foreign Minister Zhang Zhijun.
Igor Morgulov, a director of the Russian Foreign Ministryâ€™s Asian department, expressed â€œextreme concernâ€ over North Koreaâ€™s readiness to use military force in a phone call yesterday with North Korean Ambassador Kim Yong-Jae.
â€œAll contentious issues between the two Koreas should be resolved by the resumption of dialogue and exclusively by political and diplomatic means,â€ said Morgulov in a statement on the Foreign Ministryâ€™s website.
South Koreaâ€™s Unification Minister held a meeting early today to review the situation at Mt. Geumgang resort, which is located in North Korea, Yonhap News said, citing an unidentified ministry official.
â€˜Closely Watchingâ€™
The ministry is â€œclosely watchingâ€ the situation and is reviewing emergency measures after North Koreaâ€™s threat to respond to South Korean artillery drills, Yonhap said.
South Korea issued a warning to civilian ships yesterday on the website of the Korea Hydrographic and Oceanographic Administration.
North Korea doesnâ€™t recognize the western sea border demarcated by the United Nations after the war and demands it should be drawn further south to include Yeonpyeong and neighboring islands in North Korean waters.
â€œNo one in the world would allow those who drew a line inside otherâ€™s court, without its ownerâ€™s knowledge, and insist it belongs to them and shamelessly conduct saber-rattling to preserve it,â€ KCNA said in its statement yesterday.
Retaliation to any further attack would include airstrikes, South Koreaâ€™s Defense Minister Kim Kwan Jin said on Dec. 3.