North Korea Denounces South Korea's Front-Line Fire Exercise As Military Provocation

North Korea on Friday slammed Korean military's largest-ever live-fire exercise conducted to mark last year's inter-Korean artillery clash, denouncing it as a rash provocation. South Korea's military on Thursday carried out the drill along the tense inter-Korean border, involving 49 front-line artillery battalions. 

    It was the military's biggest-ever artillery exercise in size, with about 300 guns being fired in a show of force. It took place two days before South Korea marks the anniversary of a brief artillery engagement with North Korea on Aug. 20. The exercise aimed to demonstrate Seoul's determination to firmly counter Pyongyang's military provocations. 

    "In the past, (South Korea) has been crazy about military provocations driven by a war fever to invade North Korea, but the latest shelling exercise which involved so many artillery units lurking along the front-line is unprecedented," Yonhap News Agency quoted North's ruling-party Rodong Sinmun newspaper as saying.

    The large-scale fire exercise is bringing the Korean Peninsula into the "worst state of crisis" ahead of South Korea's annual Ulchi Freedom Guardian drill set to start on Aug. 22, the North Korea mouthpiece newspaper said.

    The rash military act is enraging the North Korean military and people, the newspaper claimed, warning that "any rash military provocation will result in (South Korea) paying a high-price penalty."

Source: QNA