ÐÇ¿Õ´«Ã½

Skip to main content

South Korean troops fired warning shots after North Korean soldiers briefly crossed land border

Visitors view a map of the two Koreas border area at the unification observatory in Paju, South Korea, on Tuesday, June 11, 2024. (Lee Jin-man / AP Photo) Visitors view a map of the two Koreas border area at the unification observatory in Paju, South Korea, on Tuesday, June 11, 2024. (Lee Jin-man / AP Photo)
Share
SEOUL, South Korea -

South Korean soldiers fired warning shots after North Korean troops briefly violated the tense border earlier this week, South Korea's military said Tuesday, as the rivals are embroiled in Cold War-style campaigns like balloon launches and propaganda broadcasts.

Bloodshed and violent confrontations have occasionally occurred at the Koreas' heavily fortified border, called the Demilitarized Zone. While Sunday's incident happened amid simmering tensions between the two Koreas, observers say it won't likely develop into another source of animosity as South Korea believes the North Koreans didn't deliberately commit the border intrusion and North Korea also didn't return fire.

At 12:30 p.m. on Sunday, some North Korean soldiers who were engaged in unspecified work on the northern side of the border crossed the military demarcation line that bisects the two countries, South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said.

Those North Korean soldiers carrying construction tools — some of them armed — immediately returned to their territory after South Korea’s military fired warning shots and issued warning broadcasts, the Joint Chiefs of Staff said. It said North Korea had not conducted any other suspicious activities.

South Korea’s military has assessed that the North Korean soldiers didn’t appear to have intentionally crossed the border because the site is a wooded area and MDL signs there weren’t clearly visible, Joint Chiefs of Staff spokesperson Lee Sung Joon told reporters.

Lee gave no further details. But South Korean media reports said that about 20-30 North Korean soldiers had entered South Korean territory about 50 metres (165 feet) after they likely lost their way. The reports said most of the North Korean soldiers were carrying pickaxes and other construction tools.

The 248-kilometre (155-mile) -long, four-kilometre (2.5-mile)-wide DMZ is the world’s most heavily armed border. An estimated two  million mines are peppered inside and near the border, which is also guarded by barbed wire fences, tank traps and combat troops on both sides. It’s a legacy of the 1950-53 Korean War, which ended with an armistice, not a peace treaty.

On Sunday, South Korea resumed anti-Pyongyang propaganda broadcasts from its border loudspeakers in response to the North’s recent launches of balloons carrying manure and rubbish across the border. South Korea said North Korea has installed its own border loudspeakers in response but hasn’t turned them on yet.

North Korea has said its balloon campaign was in response to South Korean activists' launches of their own balloons to drop propaganda leaflets critical of leader Kim Jong Un's authoritarian rule, USB sticks with K-pop songs and South Korean drama shows, and other items in North Korea.

North Korea is extremely sensitive to any outside criticism of its political system as most of its 26 million people have no official access to foreign news. On Sunday night, Kim's sister and senior official, Kim Yo Jong, warned of “a new response†if South Korea continued its loudspeaker broadcasts and refused to stop civilian leafletting campaigns.

The tit-for-tat over speakers and balloons — both Cold War-style psychological warfare — have deepened tensions between the Koreas as talks over the North’s nuclear ambitions have remained stalled for years.

CTVNews.ca ÐÇ¿Õ´«Ã½

Top Hezbollah commander among 12 killed in Israeli strike on Beirut

Israel killed a top Hezbollah commander and several members of the group's elite Radwan unit in an airstrike on Beirut's southern suburbs on Friday, the Israeli military and a security source in Lebanon said, sharply escalating the year-long conflict between Israel and the Iran-backed group.

Since she was a young girl growing up in Vancouver, Ginny Lam says her mom Yat Hei Law made it very clear she favoured her son William, because he was her male heir.

An Ontario man says it is 'unfair' to pay a $1,500 insurance surcharge because his four-year-old SUV is at a higher risk of being stolen.

The province's public security minister said he was "shocked" Thursday amid reports that a body believed to be that of a 14-year-old boy was found this week near a Hells Angels hideout near Quebec City.

Local Spotlight

They say a dog is a man’s best friend. In the case of Darren Cropper, from Bonfield, Ont., his three-year-old Siberian husky and golden retriever mix named Bear literally saved his life.

A growing group of brides and wedding photographers from across the province say they have been taken for tens of thousands of dollars by a Barrie, Ont. wedding photographer.

Paleontologists from the Royal B.C. Museum have uncovered "a trove of extraordinary fossils" high in the mountains of northern B.C., the museum announced Thursday.

The search for a missing ancient 28-year-old chocolate donkey ended with a tragic discovery Wednesday.

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police is celebrating an important milestone in the organization's history: 50 years since the first women joined the force.

It's been a whirlwind of joyful events for a northern Ontario couple who just welcomed a baby into their family and won the $70 million Lotto Max jackpot last month.

A Good Samaritan in New Brunswick has replaced a man's stolen bottle cart so he can continue to collect cans and bottles in his Moncton neighbourhood.

David Krumholtz, known for roles like Bernard the Elf in The Santa Clause and physicist Isidor Rabi in Oppenheimer, has spent the latter part of his summer filming horror flick Altar in Winnipeg. He says Winnipeg is the most movie-savvy town he's ever been in.

Edmontonians can count themselves lucky to ever see one tiger salamander, let alone the thousands one local woman says recently descended on her childhood home.