N. Korea issues new threat over island

SEOUL, Dec. 17 (UPI) -- North Korea threatened Friday to strike again if South Korea carries out scheduled live-fire exercises from the island the North shelled in November.

"Second and third self-defensive blows that cannot be predicted will be dealt" if South Korea conducts the one-day drill scheduled between Saturday and Tuesday, the North's military said in a statement carried by the official Korean Central News Agency and reported by the South's Yonhap News Agency.

The North warned, "The intensity and range of the firepower will create a situation more serious than one on Nov. 23," when it shelled Yeonpyeong island and killed two marines and two civilians.

"The South Korean puppet warmongers must immediately cancel the provocative coastal live-fire drills planned on Yeonpyeong," an unidentified military official said. He claimed the sea surrounding the small island part of "our sacred territorial waters."

The KCNA said the warning was delivered to the South's Defense Ministry around noon Friday.

North Korea has said any shells fired from Yeonpyeong are bound to violate its waters because the country does not recognize the Yellow Sea border drawn at the armistice in 1953.