BREAKING: Reports are coming in through that U.S. troops who were already in South Korea as part of annual practice drills have been mobilized in response to the North’s provocation.
#US troops’ vehicles mobilized in the South #Korean town of #Paju and #Paj bordering North #Korea 📷 pic.twitter.com/mphlSyMetg
— Mete Sohtaoğlu (@metesohtaoglu) August 21, 2015
We have been following the war-like exchanges between North Korea and South Korea very closely for the past few days (read here and here), and things this evening seem to have made a turn for the worse. After South Korea removed citizens from the border area, it is now being announced that the Korea’s are on the “brink of war”. If South Korea doesn’t stop what North Korea is calling its “Propaganda broadcasts” over the border by Saturday, the North says it will begin “indiscriminate attacks” against the country. RT.com reports: During an emergency meeting of the North Korean central military commission, Kin Jong-un reportedly ordered the North’s army to be “fully operational and ready for any military action at any time” from 5pm Friday local time, also putting the area along the border with the South “in a semi-state of war,” North Korean state media reported. North Korea also delivered an ultimatum to the South demanding it stop broadcasting propaganda via loudspeakers across the two countries’ borders and setting a deadline of 5 pm on Saturday. The North threatened with ‘imminent’military action if the demands aren’t met by Seoul. “Psychological warfare against [North Korea] is, in essence, an open act of war against it,” North Korea’s state-run KCNA news agency said in a statement on Friday.
BREAKING: Pyongyang prepares short and medium range missile launches – S.Korean report http://t.co/V7w2pceAE0 pic.twitter.com/JWDIcYVzgo
— RT (@RT_com) August 21, 2015
LATEST: Situation on Korean peninsula is close to war – #NorthKorea envoy to China http://t.co/V7w2pceAE0 pic.twitter.com/rtujOSRatQ — RT (@RT_com) August 21, 2015
N. Korea leader orders ‘state of war’ readiness after exchange of fire with South http://t.co/V7w2pceAE0 pic.twitter.com/N4rfgGkQLX
— RT (@RT_com) August 20, 2015
#US troops’ vehicles mobilized in the South #Korean town of #Paju and #Paj bordering North #Korea 📷 pic.twitter.com/mphlSyMetg
— Mete Sohtaoğlu (@metesohtaoglu) August 21, 2015
The Chinese foreign ministry has also expressed “deep concern” about the situation on the Korean peninsula in a statement on Friday. China called on the two sides to stop all actions stirring up trouble, and to maintain “calm and restraint,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman, Hua Chunying said.
Tensions between the two Koreas started to spike this month, after two South Korean soldiers were wounded in a landmine explosion, which Seoul believes was planted by the North. Pyongyang denies the accusations.
In response, the South started setting up propaganda loudspeakers along the border between the two countries, which will be in place until the North “apologizes for the mines,” according to the South’s Vice Defense Minister Baek Seung-joo.
On Thursday, the North shelled the border area, apparently targeting one of the loudspeakers. The South retaliated with dozens of artillery shells, as reported by the Yonhap news agency.
Although, no casualties or damage was reported, the incident has escalated the unease, with South Korea evacuating civilians from the area along its border with the North.