Fears mount that North Korea is preparing to attack!
LONDON, England - June 2, 2009 - It was obvious that something was up when the Chinese scampered. One day there were scores of their fishing boats hoovering up the valuable crabs from the richest of the fishing grounds in the Yellow Sea.
Overnight, all but a handful were gone.
Anywhere else the locals would have been glad to have the crabs to themselves but this is no ordinary fishing ground. A few yards from here is the maritime boundary between South and North Korea. “The Chinese fish here because the North Koreans allow them to,” a coast guard official said. “If they’ve gone it’s because they’ve had some kind of warning.”
An imminent missile launch into the sea? An armed incursion of North Korean ships? A full-scale invasion of Yeonpyeong, the small South Korean island hard up against the maritime boundary? Too much blood has already been shed in these waters for anyone to risk taking any chances, and for the past week South Korea has been dispatching reinforcements.
No one will discuss numbers for security reasons, but sailors and marines, as well as members of the Sea Special Attack Team, the coast guard’s commando force, have been arriving to join the several hundred troops already on Yeonpyeong.
These waters, around the Northern Limit Line, have become the most tense and dangerous patch of sea in Asia.
The rest of the world is pondering what to do about North Korea’s underground test of a nuclear bomb eight days ago. Yesterday, fresh reports emerged that the nation was transporting its most advanced missile, theoretically capable of reaching Alaska (though it has never sustained a successful test), to a launch site. David Miliband, the Foreign Secretary, said that Britain and other members of the UN Security Council were drafting new sanctions against Pyongyang.
