The Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) in Seoul has dismissed a report that intelligence officials obtained in August secret information that North Korea was planning to stage an attack on five South Korean islands in the Yellow Sea.

A JCS official told reporters Thursday that the intelligence obtained in August involved the North’s orders to prepare for a firing of artillery following artillery training by the South Korean military.

The military units on Yeonpyeong Island conducted artillery practice using K-9 self-propelled guns on August sixth and eighth. Then on August ninth, the North fired its coastal artillery toward the Northern Limit Line near Yeonpyeong.