"We call on the DPRK to refrain from further provocative, destabilizing actions and return to diplomacy," State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said, referring to the North by its official name, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.
"In particular, we encourage the DPRK to engage in substantive discussions on identifying ways to manage military risks and create lasting peace on the Korean Peninsula," he said.
"As we have repeatedly made clear, the United States harbors no hostile intent towards the DPRK."
North Korea's military said it had conducted a naval live-fire drill as a "natural countermeasure" against alleged threats by South Korea, a treaty-bound ally of the United States, which stations troops in the democratic country.
North Korea has repeatedly rebuffed offers for dialogue with President Joe Biden's administration.
North Korea leader Kim Jong Un met three times with Biden's predecessor Donald Trump, an unusually personal diplomatic approach that reduced tensions but produced no lasting agreement.
South Korea's two border islands: five things to know
Seoul (AFP) Jan 5, 2024 -
North and South Korea both conducted live-fire artillery drills near two small islands close to the tense maritime border Friday, with residents saying they were "shaking in fear" during the incident.
But where are these islands, who lives there, and what is life like on one of the front lines between North and South?
AFP takes a look at what we know:
Where are they?
Both islands are extremely close -- less than two kilometres (1.5 miles) -- to the de facto maritime border between the two Koreas known as the Northern Limit Line (NLL).
Control of the islands was awarded to South Korea in the 1953 armistice agreement, which ended fighting in the Korean War, but the deal did not specify an exact maritime border -- and was never replaced by an official peace treaty, meaning the countries remain technically at war.
Although they're controlled by Seoul and on the southern side of the de facto maritime border, the islands, Yeonpyeong and Baengnyeong, are much closer to North Korea.
Baengnyeong is some 210 kilometres west of Seoul, but just 14 kilometres from the North Korean mainland. Yeonpyeong is about 115 kilometres west of Seoul.
Baengnyeong island is of strategic importance for Seoul, as it helps determine control over vital Yellow Sea shipping lanes, without which South Korea's Incheon harbour would be cut off from the world.
Has this happened before?
In 2010, in response to a South Korean live-fire drill near the sea border, the North bombarded Yeonpyeong island killing four South Koreans -- two soldiers and two civilians.
That was the first attack on a civilian area since the 1950-53 Korean War.
The South returned fire, with the resulting exchange lasting more than an hour, as the two sides traded more than 200 shells, sparking brief fears of a full-fledged war.
During the 2010 incident, a North Korean artillery shell slammed into Kim Soon-ok's house and blew up the top floor.
The cafe owner told AFP in 2018 that the attack forced her to run barefoot into the street, terrified and screaming that war had broken out.
"Whenever I hear a loud thump, I check outside by reflex," Kim said at the time.
"I always go to bed with a bag packed just in case."
What about the buffer zone?
The de facto maritime border was the scene of deadly naval clashes in 1999, 2002 and 2009.
Baengnyeong has also long been a potential military flashpoint: North Korea's Kim Jong Un claimed in 2013 that he could "rain down a sea of fire" on the island, and then staged amphibious mock invasion drills in 2017.
In 2018, during a period of warmer ties, both sides signed a military deal aimed at reducing tensions, in which they committed to preventing accidental clashes in a so-called buffer zone along the NLL.
But Seoul partially suspended the agreement in November to protest Pyongyang's launch of a spy satellite, with the North jettisoning the entire deal soon after.
"It is not unusual for North Korea to fire artillery into the West Sea during its winter exercises," said Leif-Eric Easley, a professor at Ewha University in Seoul.
"What's different this year is the two Koreas have recently backed away from a military confidence-building agreement, and Kim Jong Un has publicly disavowed reconciliation and unification with the South.
"Pyongyang could miscalculate that its claimed nuclear weapons give it control over escalation in case of a deadly incident."
What are they like?
Every corner of Yeonpyeong holds a grim reminder of its proximity to North Korea and the deadly attack in 2010.
Seoul has stationed extra troops and weaponry on the island, with military posts scattered throughout, and the sounds of practice artillery fire frequently reverberate across the area.
Education sessions on emergency evacuation are a regular event, usually held at one of a handful of bunkers.
And at the centre of Yeonpyeong village, two houses shelled in 2010 have been preserved as an education centre and macabre tourist attraction, including rusty burned bikes and slabs of smashed concrete stairs.
But residents lament that the bombardment has scared away tourists since 2010.
Local media reports say the low-income population in Yeonpyeong has increased by more than four times since the deadly shelling 14 years ago.
Tourist destination?
Despite the dangers -- the ferry to the island takes a roundabout route to make it less vulnerable to North Korean attack -- Baengnyeong is a niche tourist destination.
Hundreds of mostly domestic tourists visit each week, drawn by both the proximity to the North, and also the natural beauty of the location.
The island's ancient geological features hold a lesson for those worried about its frontline position, Kim Chang-hee, 75, a park guide, told AFP in 2022.
"This island is over 10 million years old," she said. "Korea has only been divided for 70 years. One day, this too will be a distant memory."
North Korea fires artillery shells near South Korean islands
Seoul (AFP) Jan 5, 2024 -
North Korea fired an artillery barrage near two South Korean border islands Friday, Seoul's defence ministry said, prompting a live-fire drill by the South's military.
Residents of the two islands were ordered to evacuate to shelters and ferries were suspended amid one of the most serious military escalations on the peninsula since Pyongyang fired shells at one of the islands in 2010.
North Korea's military said it had conducted a naval live-fire drill as a "natural countermeasure" against South Korean threats, according to a statement on the official Korean Central News Agency.
Seoul's defence ministry said the rival military fired more than 200 rounds of artillery shells near Yeonpyeong and Baengnyeong, two sparsely populated islands situated just south of a defacto maritime border between the two sides.
It said the shells landed in a buffer zone created under a 2018 tension-reducing deal, which fell apart in November after the North launched a spy satellite.
Resuming artillery fire in the buffer zone "is a provocative act that threatens peace on the Korean Peninsula and escalates tensions", Seoul's defence minister Shin Won-sik said.
In response, Seoul's military will take "immediate, strong, and final retaliation -- we must back peace with overwhelming force", he added.
North Korea's military warned Seoul should not commit "a provocation under the pretext of so-called counteraction", according to KCNA. It threatened the North would "show tough counteraction on an unprecedented level".
It said the shells fired did not even have "an indirect effect" on Baengnyeong and Yeonpyeong.
Pyongyang's major ally and benefactor China called for "restraint" from all sides, while the United States urged North Korea to end its "destabilizing actions and return to diplomacy".
- Evacuation orders -
Yeonpyeong, which has around 2,000 residents, is about 115 kilometres (70 miles) west of Seoul. Baengnyeong, with a population of 4,900, is about 210 kilometres west of Seoul.
Local officials said residents had been told to evacuate to shelters as a "preventative measure" ahead of the South Korean military drill. The order was lifted hours later, South Korea's Yonhap news agency reported.
One resident of the island said they were "shaking in fear" at the barrage.
"At first I thought it was the shells fired by our own military... but was told later it was by North Korea," Kim Jin-soo, a Baengnyeong resident told local broadcaster YTN.
In November, Seoul partially suspended the 2018 military accord to protest Pyongyang's putting a spy satellite into orbit. The North then scrapped the deal completely.
"The nullification of the (accord) increases the possibility of military clashes in the border areas," Yang Moo-jin, president of the University of North Korean Studies in Seoul, told AFP.
He added that "the evacuation of our residents raises psychological and security concerns, which can ultimately destabilise the economy of South Korea".
- 2010 clash -
In 2010, in response to a South Korean live-fire drill near the sea border, the North bombarded Yeonpyeong island killing four South Koreans -- two soldiers and two civilians.
That was the first attack on a civilian area since the 1950-53 Korean War.
South Korea returned fire in an exchange which lasted more than an hour, as the two sides traded more than 200 shells, sparking brief fears of a full-fledged war.
Relations between the two Koreas are at one of their lowest points in decades, after the North's leader Kim Jong-Un enshrined the country's status as a nuclear power into the constitution while test-firing several advanced inter-continental ballistic missiles.
At year-end policy meetings, Kim warned of a nuclear attack on the South and called for a build-up of the country's military arsenal, warning that conflict could "break out any time".
To deter Pyongyang, the United States deployed a nuclear-powered submarine in the South Korean port city of Busan and flew long-range bombers in drills with the South and Japan.
North Korea described the deployments as "intentional nuclear war provocative moves".
On Friday, KCNA said Kim called for the ramping-up of missile launcher production "given the prevailing grave situation that requires the country to be more firmly prepared for a military showdown with the enemy."
His comments came after the White House accused North Korea of providing Russia with ballistic missiles and missile launchers that were used in recent attacks on Ukraine. Washington has called this an escalation of Pyongyang's support for Moscow.
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