A top South Korean official has said that North Korea is likely to attack again -- a warning that comes amid high tensions following the deadly exchange of fire last week.
Won Sei-hoon, director of South Korea's National Intelligence Service, said Pyongyang is trying to establish the credentials of its new and untested leader-designate -- Kim Jong Il's youngest son.
"There is a high possibility that the North will make another attack," he was quoted by South Korea's Yonhap news agency as saying behind closed doors.
The intelligence chief suggested there are internal complaints about Kim Jong Un's succession, and said the military bluster by Pyongyang is an attempt to establish his reputation as a powerful leader, as well as win concessions from the international community.
Tensions have been high in the region since North Korea fired an artillery barrage on the small island of Yeonpyeong, killing two South Korean marines and two civilians.
The attack triggered return fire from South Korea, which also sent additional troops and firepower to the area, which is the subject of a border dispute between the Koreas.
South Korea then planned joint live-fire exercises with U.S. allies -- a plan that Pyongyang described as a direct provocation.
The artillery exercises were eventually postponed, but other joint U.S.-South Korea initiatives took place.
In North Korea, Pyongyang's government has insisted that the U.S. has acted as an aggressor by planning the joint military drills in disputed waters.
A North Korean military official bragged about the attack last Tuesday on Yeonpyeong in which the military "precisely aimed and hit the enemy artillery base."
The official also made reference to a possible forthcoming "shower of dreadful fire."
In South Korea, more troops and better weapons were being deployed to the island, while the president and his government tried to pin down their next move against the unpredictable and defiant North Korea regime.
While the U.S. has sent a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier to the Yellow Sea to take part in the exercises with South Korea, there seem to be few options for defusing the crisis.
As a result, South Korea and the U.S. are leaning on China to help drop the temperature of the feverish resentment that is building up in North Korea.
China is a rare source of influence on North Korea and Chinese state media announced Friday that Beijing's foreign minister had met with the North Korean ambassador.
On Wednesday, China's foreign minister called on all parties to avoid further inflaming heightened tensions on the Korean peninsula.
The official Xinhua News Agency quoted Yang Jiechi as saying that calm and restraint are required and talks are now needed to cool down the situation.
Nothing should be done to "inflame the situation," said Yang in the highest-level Chinese comment yet on the crisis.
With files from The Associated Press
