The Korean conflict is an ongoing conflict based on the division of Korea between North Korea (Democratic People’s Republic of Korea) and South Korea (Republic of Korea), both of which claim to be the sole legitimate government of all of Korea. Amidst these tensions, a claim has gone viral that North Korea shelled South Korea’s Yeonpyeong and Baengnyeongdo islands on the north-western border.
Who shared this claim?
An X user named Megatron shared the claim that “North Korea shelled South Korea’s Yeonpyeong and Baengnyeongdo islands on the north-western border.”
Soon after the post, multiple other users also shared the same claim.
Fact Check
We investigated the viral claim. We found media reports about the reality of the incident.
The BBC’s report mentioned, “ The artillery shells fired on Friday, between 09:00 to 11:00 local time (00:00 to 02:00 GMT), did not enter South Korean territory as they all landed in the buffer zone between the two countries.
South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said the incident caused “no damage to our people or military”, but added that the act “threatens peace on the Korean peninsula and raises tensions”.
In CNN’s report, they mentioned, “ In response South Korea’s military held its own maritime shooting exercise on Friday afternoon, with the defense ministry saying it was to ‘respond to North Korea’s provocation of shooting artilleries inside the no-hostile act zone this morning.’”
Thus there was no mention of South Korea, “responding with live artillery” other than its own maritime shooting exercise.
Conclusion
Thus, from the fact check, it is clear that the artillery shells fired did not enter South Korean territory as they all landed in the buffer zone between the two countries.
Hence, the claim is Misleading
