North Korea fires some 200 artillery shells off western coast

North Korea fired some 200 artillery shells into waters off its western coast on January 5 morning, Seoul's military said.

The Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said it detected the artillery firings from Jangsan Cape, north of South Korea's northernmost island of Baengnyeong, and Deungsan Cape, north of the South's western border island of Yeonpyeong, from 09:00 to 11:00, Yonhap reports.

The shells splashed into the maritime buffer zone north of the Northern Limit Line (NLL), the de facto maritime border. The buffer zone was set under an inter-Korean military accord signed on Sept. 19, 2018, to reduce border tensions.

The North unilaterally scrapped the accord last November after Seoul partially suspended the deal in protest of the North's successful launch of a military spy satellite.

The North's latest sabre-rattling came after North Korean leader Kim Jong-un defined inter-Korean ties as relations "between two states hostile to each other" and called for stepped-up preparations to "suppress the whole territory of South Korea" in a year-end ruling party meeting.