(4th LD) Divided Koreas clash off west coast, N. Korean navy battered: officials

(ATTN: CORRECTS N. Korean crossing time in para 4; ADDS comment on battle in para 7)
By Sam Kim
SEOUL, Nov. 10 (Yonhap) -- The navies of the two Koreas clashed Tuesday off the
west coast of their divided peninsula, with no South Korean casualties reported
while the North Korean side appears to have suffered "considerable" damage,
officials here said.
"It wasn't a close-range battle. We fired heavily on the North Korean vessel," a
Navy official said, adding no South Korean sailors were killed in the clash, the
first in seven years.
"It is our initial assessment that the North Korean boat suffered considerable
damage," he said, declining to be identified because the information was
preliminary.
The North Korean patrol boat crossed the Northern Limit Line (NLL) -- where
clashes turned bloody in 1999 and 2002 -- at 11:27 a.m. and prompted the South
Korean Navy to fire warning shots, he said.
"The North Koreans then fired back," another official said, adding the skirmish
occurred shortly after 11:30 a.m. near Baekryeong island, just several kilometers
south of the NLL.
"We are analyzing the motive for the North Korean boat's crossing. We do not rule
out the possibility that the clash may have been accidental," the official said,
asking for anonymity.
The officials did not identify the ships that engaged in the clash. "The battle
itself lasted no more than a minute," one official said.
North Korea disputes the NLL, drawn by a U.S. general at the end of the 1950-53
Korean War that ended in a truce, leaving the Koreas technically in a state of
war.
The clash comes amid an accelerating thaw between the Koreas, whose relations
turned frosty following the inauguration of South Korean President Lee Myung-bak
early last year.
South Korea recently deployed its latest high-speed guided-missile boat along the
NLL.
samkim@yna.co.kr
(END)