DPRK building artillery positions near inter-Korean sea border: S.Korea

The Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) is building artillery positions in an uninhabited island just above the inter-Korean maritime border, South Korea's military said Tuesday.

Defense Ministry spokesman Kim Min-seok told a press briefing that the DPRK military is constructing facilities in the island of Gal, just some 4.5 km north of the South Korea's border island of Yeonpyeong.

Given the Gal island's geopolitical position and the close distance from the Yeonpyeong island, the DPRK facilities would pose a serious threat to the South Korean military's operation near the Northern Limit Line (NLL), Kim said.

The NLL, which was drawn by the U.S.-led forces after the 1950- 53 Korean War ended in a ceasefire, has served as a de-facto maritime border between the two Koreas, which the DPRK claimed must be redrawn farther south.

The South Korean military authorities were quoted by Yonhap News Agency as saying that the DPRK has already completed the construction of five bunker-shaped positions for 122-mm multiple rocket launchers.

The 122-mm multiple rocket launchers were mobilized when Pyongyang carried out an artillery strike against the Yeonpyeong island in November 2010 and killed two South Korean civilians and two marines.

The South Korean military deployed Spike missiles with a range of 20 km in May 2013 in the Yeonpyeong and its nearby Baengnyeong island to counter possible artillery attacks from the DPRK. Endi