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| ▲ This photo, carried by North Korea's official Korean Central News Agency on Oct. 19, 2024, shows a damaged drone that Pyongyang claims was sent by the South Korean military. The drone is being described by Pyongyang as the same type that was publicly displayed on Armed Forces Day in Seoul earlier that month. (For Use Only in the Republic of Korea. No Redistribution) (Yonhap) |
(LEAD) N Korea-drone incursion
(LEAD) N. Korea accuses S. Korea of drone incursions, warns Seoul will 'pay dear price'
(ATTN: RECASTS headline, lead; UPDATES throughout)
SEOUL, Jan. 10 (Yonhap) -- North Korea claimed Saturday that South Korea infringed on its sovereignty with drone incursions in September last year and earlier this week, saying that Seoul should be ready to "pay a high price" for what it called a provocation.
On Jan. 4, North Korea's military captured and tracked an air target moving northward from the sky over Ganghwa County of Incheon in the South, a spokesperson of the General Staff of the Korean People's Army said in a statement carried by the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).
The North's military struck the drone with special electronic warfare assets and forced it to fall about 1,200 meters away from Muksan-ri, near the border city of Kaesong, it said.
"The crashed drone was equipped with surveillance devices," the official said, noting that it was supposed to record North Korea's major objects with cameras while flying a total distance of 156 kilometers for more than three hours.
North Korea also claimed a similar drone incursion occurred in September last year, accusing South Korea of continuing to commit provocative acts near the border even after the change of government in Seoul in June last year.
On Sept. 27, a drone, which took off from the South's border city of Paju, was struck down by the North Korean military's electronic means while returning following an infiltration into the sky over Phyongsan County, North Hwanghae Province in the North, according to the KCNA.
North Korea said the drone incursions reminded it of South Korea's "hostile" nature, claiming that Seoul does not stop its provocation against the North while calling for efforts to resume dialogue with Pyongyang.
"The ROK is the enemy most hostile towards us that can never be changed in nature, and the object to be certainly collapsed by us if it attacks," the spokesperson said. ROK is short for South Korea's official name, the Republic of Korea.
"The ROK military warmongers will be surely forced to pay a dear price for their unpardonable hysteria," the official warned.
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