South Korea’s Ministry of National Defense (MND) indicated that North Korea has announced that the rogue state will be conducting live firing drills within the vicinity of the disputed maritime border.
Just last month, the two Korean countries traded artillery fire across the disputed western sea border. In light of this, it would be the second time within the past month that Pyongyang would have carried out such exercises.
The South Korean defense ministry indicated that it had been notified that the live firing drills would take place near a couple of islands to the west of the Korean peninsula. A spokesman for the South indicated that their military was “fully prepared”, according to a BBC report. The defense ministry spokesman was quoted by the AFP news agency as having said:
The North notified us there would be live-fire drills today north of the [border] near Yeonpyeong and Baengnyeong islands
While the United Nations drew the western border up after the Korean War, the North Korean regime has never recognized it. The war — which took place between June 25, 1950 and July 27, 1953 — was a war between the Republic of Korea (South Korea) and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea) which came after World War II, as the two newly formed countries became ideologically opposite from one another and subsequent related events.
The war began with the invasion of the Republic of Korea (ROK) by the North Korean People’s Army (NKPA) on June 25, 1950. It wasn’t until June 27, 1953 that the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, United Nations, and the Chinese People’s Volunteers got together and signed an armistice agreement, effectively ending the fighting.
As there has never been a peace treaty between the two Koreas, the Korean War has technically never come to an end.
