Seoul - North and South Korea blamed one another Tuesday for a clash of warships off their west coasts that Seoul said left a patrol ship from the North in flames. Both governments agreed that South Korea was the first to fire. South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff said they were warning shots fired after a North Korean patrol ship had crossed the Northern Limit Line, the countries' disputed maritime border in the Yellow Sea. The other vessel then returned fire, it said.
The Supreme Command of the North's Korean People's Army, however, accused the South of chasing its ship into the North's territorial waters, calling it a "grave provocation" and demanding an apology from Seoul.
No South Koreans were hurt in the skirmish near Baekryeong Island, the South Korean military said. There were no reports from North Korea on casualties although South Korean Prime Minister Chung Un Chan said its ship was "engulfed in flame."
The North Korean Supreme Command said in reports published in state media that its ship was on a routine patrol tracking an unidentified object and was returning to port when the skirmish broke out.
"A group of warships of the South Korean forces chased it and perpetrated such a grave provocation as firing at it," the command said.
Chung Un Chan characterized the battle as an "accidental clash." He told the National Assembly that it occurred when "the North Korean side disregarded our verbal warnings and warning shots and directly attacked our speedboats."
"We fired heavily on the North Korean vessel," a South Korean naval official was quoted as saying by the Yonhap News Agency.
"It is our initial assessment that the North Korean boat suffered considerable damage," he said.
It was the first maritime clash between the two Koreas in seven years. Deadly sea battles had taken place near the Northern Limit Line in 1999 and 2002.
North Korea does not recognize the Northern Limit Line, which was established unilaterally by a US general at the end of the 1950-53 Korean War. That war ended with a truce, not a peace treaty, leaving both Koreas still technically at war.
Relations between the impoverished Stalinist North and capitalist South, which has Asia's fourth-largest economy, have deteriorated since conservative President Lee Myung Bak took office in South Korea in February 2008.
A cautious rapprochement had taken place, however, in the past several months, but in mid-October, North Korea accused its neighbour of sending warships into its territorial waters in the Yellow Sea. The North's navy threatened military action if there was a repeated violation of its border.
The clash occurred three days before US President Barack Obama begins a four-nation Asian tour that is to bring him to South Korea. It also came on the same day The Washington Post reported that Obama plans to dispatch Stephen Bosworth, his special representative for North Korea, to Pyongyang for discussions aimed at resuming international nuclear disarmament talks with it.
No date has been set for the visit, said the report, which cited senior US officials, but it was likely to take place before the end of the year.
North Korea withdrew from the six-nation talks aimed at ending its nuclear weapons programme in April and in May conducted its second test of a nuclear device. The detonation, along with repeated test firings of missiles, prompted another round UN Security Council sanctions.
