The South Korean military immediately went to “crisis status,” said a Defense Ministry official. There were widespread media reports that Seoul had scrambled F-16 fighter jets but the official declined to confirm whether the planes were in the air.
The South Korean broadcaster YTN reported that one marine had been killed and three others seriously wounded in the shelling on the island, in addition to two civilian casualties. TV footage showed large plumes of black smoke spiraling from the island.
South Korean artillery units returned fire after the North’s shells struck South Korea’s Yeonpyeong Island at 2:34 p.m., said Kiyheon Kwon, an official at the Defense Ministry . The North also fired numerous rounds into the Yellow Sea, he said.
South Korean President Lee Myung-bak said he was trying to prevent the clash from escalating into a greater conflict, Reuters reported, quoting the Yonhap news agency. YTN television reported that Seoul had warned of a stronger response if the North continued with provocations.
China expressed concern, Reuters reported, quoting a spokesman for the Chinese Foreign Ministry, Hong Lei, as telling a news conference that both sides of the Korean peninsula should “do more to contribute to peace.”
He said it was imperative to return to six-party talks aimed at ending North Korea’s nuclear weapons program, Reuters said.
A Russian Foreign Ministry official, who was not identified by name, urged calm. “It is important that this not escalate tensions on the Korean peninsula,” he told the Interfax news agency.
The shelling came just days after an American nuclear scientist who visited North Korea earlier this month said he had been shown a vast new facility built secretly and rapidly to enrich uranium.
The scientist, Siegfried S. Hecker, a Stanford professor who previously directed the Los Alamos National Laboratory, said in an interview that he had been “stunned” by the sophistication of the new plant, where he saw “hundreds and hundreds” of centrifuges that had just been installed in a recently gutted building and operated from what he called “an ultra-modern control room.” The North Koreans claimed 2,000 centrifuges were already installed and running, he said.
The development confronted the Obama administration with the prospect that North Korea country is preparing to expand its nuclear arsenal or build a far more powerful type of atomic bomb.
Whether the calculated revelation is a negotiating ploy by North Korea or a signal that it plans to accelerate its weapons program even as it goes through a perilous leadership change, it creates a new challenge for President Obama at a moment when his program for gradual, global nuclear disarmament appears imperiled at home and abroad.
Tuesday’s exchange is the sharpest clash since the North Korean leader, Kim Jong-il, in September positioned his youngest son, Kim Jong-un, as his successor to lead the secretive nation. The younger Mr. Kim was promoted on Sept. 28 to the rank of four-star general, a prerequisite for his ascendancy to power. The elder Mr. Kim, who is said to be in poor health after apparently suffering a stroke in 2008, has hurried the succession of Kim Jong-un in recent weeks.
Other members of the Kim family and the leader’s inner circle also received new posts and promotions as the leadership hierarchy was reshuffled to provide Kim Jong-un with mentors and supporters as he solidifies his power.
South Korean military experts have previously warned that Yeonpyeong, which also is claimed by the North, is a likely place for a clash to occur between the two Koreas.
It has been the scene of two deadly sea battles in the past decade. A two-hour naval skirmish in 2002 between the Koreas’ naval forces was close enough to Yeonpyeong that residents reported the windows to their homes rattling.
Yeonpyeong sits just two miles from the so-called Northern Limit Line, which the North does not recognize, and eight miles from the North Korean coast. The island is home to a garrison of about 1,000 South Korean marines, and the navy has deployed its newest class of “patrol killer” guided-missile ships in the Yellow Sea.
About 1,600 civilians also live on the island, mostly fishermen, and the terrain is pocked with concrete bunkers, tank traps and lines of trenches. Residents conduct monthly air raid drills and keep gas masks in their homes. Posters advise islanders to keep an eye out for North Korean naval boats and submarines. After a nuclear test by the North in 2009, the island stocked its 19 bomb shelters with water and dried noodles.
Visitors to the island are screened at the ferry landing by military police officers searching for North Korean agents. The only regular link to the rest of the South is a 66-mile, two-and-a-half-hour ferry ride.
Three weeks ago, the South Korean Navy fired warning shots at a North Korean fishing boat after the vessel strayed across the two Koreas’ border, known as the Northern Limit Line. The North Korean boat then reportedly retreated to the northern side of the line.
In March, a South Korean naval vessel, the Cheonan, was sunk in the western sea, and 46 sailors died. The incident badly frayed inter-Korean relations and Seoul has blamed the sinking on a North Korean torpedo attack. The North has denied any role in incident.
In August, North Korea fired 110 artillery rounds near Yeonpyeong and another South Korean island, the Office of Joint Chiefs of Staff in Seoul said at the time.
Previous naval skirmishes occurred in the western sea in 1999 and 2002.
Kevin Drew contributed reporting from Hong Kong, and Alan Cowell contributed from Paris.
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