North Korea claimed Thursday that a flying object at which the South Korean military fired shots earlier this week was a group of birds, rejecting Seoul's announcement that it was apparently a balloon carrying propaganda leaflets.
The South's military on Tuesday fired around 90 warning shots at an unidentified object flying across the heavily fortified border, judging that it could be a drone. A day later, it said that it was probably a balloon.
(Yonhap)
The General Staff of the Korean People's Army said that the South fired more than 450 shots at "a flock of birds into the North Korean side, sparking another armed provocation across the border.
"The recent military provocation is a stopgap measure to check the war-weariness sweeping the puppet army in the face of the rapidly developing nuclear and ballistic rocket technology of the DPRK," a spokesman at the military was quoted as saying by North Korea's state agency.
The DPRK refers to the abbreviation of North Korea's full name -- the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.
North Korea said that South Korea has blamed the North for high-profile incidents including landmine explosions near the border in 2015 and the torpedoing of a South Korean warship in March 2010.
"The KPA is closely following the new confrontation hysteria of the provokers getting all the more reckless," the spokesman said.
South Korea's military dismissed the North's claims.
"It is the North Korean military's one-sided argument. It is not worthwhile to counter it," said an official at the Joint Chiefs of Staff. (Yonhap)