North Korea conducted artillery drills near the western maritime border for the third straight day on Sunday.

South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff(JCS) said on Sunday that North Korea fired some 90 shells into waters north of South Korea’s Yeonpyeong Island for about 70 minutes from 4 p.m.

The South Korean military detected that the shells fell into the buffer zone north of the Northern Limit Line(NLL), the de-facto maritime border in the Yellow Sea.

A JCS official said that the artillery did not fall south of the NLL and there was no damage to South Korea, adding that the military does not plan to respond with firing drills.

According to the JCS, the North fired some 200 artillery rounds near the two South Korean western border islands of Yeonpyeong and Baengnyeong on Friday, prompting island residents to take shelter and the South Korean military to stage live-fire drills in response.

The following day, North Korea fired some 60 shells into waters near Yeonpyeong Island, with some falling into the maritime buffer zone, but the military opted not to respond with an exercise after assessing the direction of firing to be less provocative than Friday’s.

[Photo : YONHAP News]