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The United States and South Korea have begun joint military exercises in waters west of the Korean Peninsula.
An official from US forces-Korea said that the nuclear-powered aircraft carrier USS George Washington had joined the four-day exercises.
North Korea responded by placing surface-to-surface missiles on launch pads in the Yellow Sea, the Yonhap news agency reported. It said the state had moved surface-to-air missiles near frontline areas.
North Korea has promised a “merciless military counterattack" against any intrusion into its territorial waters, state media reported.
Artillery fire
South Korea's military later said that explosions - possibly the sound of artillery fire - were heard on Yeonpyeong Island.
South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff said that what is believed to have been a round of artillery was heard on Sunday from a North Korean military base north of the sea border dividing the two Koreas. It was not immediately clear where the round landed.
Residents of the island were ordered to take shelter in underground bunkers, but that order was later withdrawn, according to Yonhap.
Dozens of reporters, along with soldiers and police and a few residents, headed for the bunkers, where they remained for 40 minutes.
"The order was lifted when no more sounds were heard," a spokesperson for the South Korean defense ministry said.
Al Jazeera's Marga Ortigas, reporting from the South Korean capital, Seoul, said that military leaders had said that the military exercises were taking place quite far from the contested waters between North and South Korea in the Yellow Sea, at least 120km south of the contested border.
"We don't know if this was some intentional change of location in some way to try to not send out signals of provocation to North Korea or if indeed they might say it was exactly where it was meant to be in the first place," she said.
Lee Myung-bak, the South Korean president, warned ministers and aides to be ready for further "provocation" by North Korea during the drill.
"There is the possibility that North Korea may do some unexpected action, so please perfectly prepare against it through cooperation with the Korea-US joint force," Lee was quoted by a spokesman as saying.
'Ensuing consequences'
North Korea's KCNA news agency said on Saturday: "If the US brings its carrier to the West Sea of Korea at last, no one can predict the ensuing consequences."
China has said it was determined to prevent an escalation of the violence in the Koreas and warned against military acts near its coast.
"The Chinese have made it very very clear that they didn’t want these drills to occur at all," Al Jazeera's Ortigas said.
China had made it clear to South Korea and the US that it "could not be responsible for what North Korea might do" if they went ahead with the military exercise, she added.
On Sunday, however, China has begun actively seeking to diffuse the tension.
South Korea said China had sent senior officials including Dai Bingguo, the state councilor to Seoul for a meeting on Sunday with Kim Sung-hwan, the South Korean foreign minister.
South Korea's Lee told the visiting officials that China must take a "more fair position" on the Korean Peninsula.
A top North Korean official is scheduled to visit China on Tuesday, the Xinhua news agency reported.
Choe Thae-Bok, the chairman of North Korea’s Supreme People's Assembly and a close confidant of Kim Jong-il, the country’s leader, was invited by Wu Bangguo, China’s second most powerful official, the report said.
The US military said the exercises, planned long before Tuesday's attack, were designed to deter North Korea and were not aimed at China.
PHOTO CAPTION
A South Korean marine helps a fellow soldier adjust his uniform as they patrol a village on Yeonpyeong Island November 28, 2010.
Al-Jazeera
