DPRK forces ordered to get ready to open fire

SEOUL -- The armed forces of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea received an order to get ready to open fire, state media said on Sunday, amid rising tensions on the Korean Peninsula following DPRK accusation of the Republic of Korea for recent drone incursion into its airspace.

"The General Staff of the Korean People's Army (KPA) issued a preliminary operation order on October 12th to the combined artillery units along the (southern) border and the units taking on an important firepower task to get fully ready to open fire," the official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) quoted a Sunday statement by the DPRK Ministry of National Defence as saying.

"The grave touch-and-go military tensions are prevailing on the Korean Peninsula due to the ROK's wanton violation of the DPRK sovereignty through infiltrations of drones into the capital city of Pyongyang," the statement noted, referring to South Korea by using the acronym of its formal name, the Republic of Korea.

The statement stressed the necessity of fully preparing its military units for coping with any developments of the evolving situation, based on an assessment by the KPA General Staff that as future drone infiltration by the ROK would lead to immediate strikes by the DPRK on specific enemy targets, the possibility of an ensuing extended armed conflict cannot be ruled out.

Anti-air observation posts have been reinforced in Pyongyang, it added.

In a separate statement on Sunday, the ministry said that it had "already judged that the ROK military is behind a series of drone infiltrations."

The ministry warned that the DPRK "will take action according to our judgment, regarding any drones to be spotted again as the ones from the ROK and deeming it a declaration of war."

Kim Yo Jong, vice department director of the Central Committee of the Workers' Party of Korea, warned in a statement on Sunday that the ROK military "should refrain from acting rashly" and instead "immediately opt for guaranteeing the prevention of recurrence of such provocation as violating the airspace of another country."

On Friday, the DPRK Foreign Ministry accused the ROK of sending drones over Pyongyang, the KCNA reported.

Later in the day, ROK's military denied the accusation, saying that "it did not send drones into North Korea."

The Yonhap News Agency quoted ROK's Joint Chiefs of Staff as saying that the ROK military sent no unmanned drone over the DPRK, but it still needed to investigate the possibility of such an act by ROK civilian advocacy groups.