North Korea Tensions High As Missile Launches Loom

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South Korea held its first naval fleet review in a decade Tuesday, putting state-of-the-art destroyers on display in a show of force amid heightened tension on the divided peninsula over North Korea's nuclear ambitions.

The review of some 50 vessels featured about two dozen foreign warships — including the USS George Washington aircraft carrier — taking part in maneuvers off South Korea's southeast coast.

It was South Korea's first fleet review since 1998, and was organized to mark the 60th anniversary of the foundation of the country's armed forces.

Like clockwork, international cooperation between South Korea and the rest of the world has driven up the rhetoric in North Korea. North Korea fired a few short range missiles to draw some attention. Apparently that was not enough, because today the threat is in regards to some Yellow Sea naval action.

North Korea's naval command on Thursday accused South Korean ships of violating its territorial waters in the Yellow Sea and warned that escalating tensions could lead to a clash.

The warning came two days after the hardline communist country fired short-range missiles in the Yellow Sea, the scene of bloody naval clashes in 1999 and 2002.

"The situation... has become so tense that a naval clash may break out due to such military provocations as the ceaseless infiltration of warships deep into the (North's) territorial waters," the state news agency KCNA quoted a navy command spokesman as saying.

He accused the South's navy of sending more warships into the North's territorial waters since early September in an attempt to legitmise the disputed sea border known as the Northern Limit Line (NLL).

Many have responded to the North Korean rhetoric, including the US.

US officials on Thursday urged North Korea to avoid missile launches and other acts that could raise tension with South Korea, amid deadlocked negotiations for Pyongyang's nuclear disarmament.

The officials also regretted that North Korea had now barred UN inspectors from its nuclear sites following its moves to restart a nuclear program it had shut down last year under the six-party disarmament negotiations.

"We would urge North Korea to avoid any steps that increase tension on the peninsula," State Department spokesman Sean McCormack told reporters when asked about rising tensions over the disputed Korean maritime borders.

Two days after it fired short-range missiles in the Yellow Sea, North Korea on Thursday accused South Korean ships of violating its territorial waters there and warned that escalating tensions could lead to a clash.

McCormack could not confirm whether North Korea had test-fired missiles, but added: "I would remind the North Korean government ... that missile-related activities are prohibited under UN Security Council Resolution 1718."

Get ready for some hot rhetoric from the Pacific, because the latest news is that North Korea is preparing to launch as many as 10 missiles. While we are fighting in 2 wars, we should not forget that technically, a state of war still exists between South Korea and North Korea, and the US is sitting in the middle of both.

All this activity has us wondering if Kim Jong-il is still alive, since he hasn't been seen since that stroke in August.