Korean tensions high after sea skirmish
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It is the third time the two navies have clashed in the Yellow Sea. (AFP: Byun Yeong-Wook)
The militaries of North and South Korea are on high alert today after their navies engaged in a brief skirmish in the Yellow Sea.
South Korea says a North Korean patrol boat ignored warning shots and charged into its waters and only turned back after being set alight by cannon fire.
Some analysts believe the incident may be part of Pyongyang's bargaining position, allowing it to send a message to the US President, who is due in Seoul next week, that he can choose two paths: negotiation or confrontation with North Korea.
By all accounts it was two minutes of hellfire.
General Lee Ki-Sik, of the South Korean Joint Chiefs of Staff, says warning shots were fired as protocol dictates.
"But the North Korean patrol boat began firing directly at our naval ship," he said.
"So we fired back and the North Koreans retreated. None of our sailors was injured."
The South Korean navy ship was hit by about 15 heavy machine gun rounds but the North Korean boat was cut open and set alight by cannon fire.
North Korean state television blamed the South for the clash, saying its patrol boat was in its own waters when it was chased by the southern ship.
This is not the first time the two navies have staged a battle on the high seas.
In 1999 and again in 2002 they clashed along the disputed sea border - a line set by the United Nations at the end of hostilities in the Korean War 56 years ago.
In the 2002 engagement six South Korean sailors and about a dozen naval personnel from the North were killed.
This year Pyongyang has carried out a nuclear test, fired a long-range ballistic missile and now engaged in a naval battle.
From land, air and sea, it has shaken its southern neighbour but the clash in the Yellow Sea seems to have rattled South Koreans more than any other provocation from Pyongyang.
"I can't believe the provocation by North Korea," one Seoul resident said. "It's making me very insecure."
"When the North occasionally takes these kinds of audacious actions I feel really insecure" a woman said.
Barack Obama will get a sense of that insecurity when he arrives in Seoul next week for official talks.
He has to decide whether to accept Pyongyang's offer of one-on-one talks and analysts are interpreting this latest naval clash as a sign that Kim Jong-Il's regime is prepared to increase the pressure on Mr Obama to choose negotiation over confrontation.
