South Korea: More shelling on attacked island

Sounds of artillery have been heard on the Yellow Sea island attacked earlier this week by North Korea, South Korea said today.

An official at the South Korean Joint Chiefs of Staff said the artillery was heard twice on the Yeonpyeong island and that military chiefs were trying to determine the details.

The apparent new conflict came after the North warned that US-South Korean military drills planned for the weekend were pushing the peninsula to the brink of war.

It was also soon after a US general toured the wreckage from the North Korean artillery attack this week.

North Korea's state news agency said earlier the drills involving South Korean forces and a US nuclear-powered supercarrier south of Tuesday's skirmish between the rival Koreas were a reckless plan by "trigger-happy elements" and the manoeuvres targeted the North.

“The situation on the Korean peninsula is inching closer to the brink of war,” the dispatch from the Korean Central News Agency said.

General Walter Sharp, the US military commander in South Korea, visited Yeonpyeong island, where four South Koreans – two marines and two civilians - were killed in the hour-long clash when the North unleashed a hail of artillery on Yeonpyeong island.

South Korean president Lee Myung-bak yesterday ordered reinforcements for about 4,000 troops on Yeonpyeong and four other Yellow Sea islands, as well as top-level weaponry for the soldiers.

He also upgraded rules of engagement that would create a new category of response when civilian areas were targeted and sacked his defence minister amid the intense criticism over lapses in the country’s response to the attack.

The South Korean Joint Chiefs of Staff said two explosive sounds were heard on Yeonpyeong. A military official. AP Television news reporters also reported a third blast.

In its “brink of war” warning today, the Korean Central News Agency added: “Gone are the days when verbal warnings are served only.”

North Korea’s army and people were “now greatly enraged” and “getting fully ready to give a shower of dreadful fire”.

“Escalated confrontation would lead to a war, and he who is fond of playing with fire is bound to perish,” the agency said.

Dressed in a heavy camouflage jacket and army fatigues and wearing a black beret, General Sharp walked down a heavily-damaged street on the island strewn with debris from buildings.

Around him were charred bicycles and shattered bottles of soju, a kind of Korean alcoholic drink.

He said the attack was a clear violation of an armistice signed in 1953 at the end of the three-year Korean War.