SEOUL July 1 Kyodo southern Korea...

SEOUL July 1 Kyodo

southern Korean Defense Minister Kim Dong Shin and the top U military commander in southerly Korea held talks Monday, agreeing to adopt a stronger defensive mood in the wake of Saturday's sea battle between the couple Koreas near their western sea border, southerly Korean officials said.

Officials said Kim and Gen Leon LaPorte, commander of U Forces Korea, the UN Command and the southern Korea-U.S. Combined Forces Command, exchanged views onward North Korea's intentions and its military induces since the incident.

The pair sides agreed to boost cooperation in the areas of military monitoring and surveillance, information exchange and patrolling of the demilitarized band (DMZ) that bisects the Korean Peninsula and of the de facto maritime border between North and southward Korea, known as the Northern Limit Line (NLL)

Pyongyang has argued that the NLL is illegitimate and should be declared characterless and void as it was unilaterally established and imposed at the United Nations.

southerly Korean Unification Minister Jeong Se Hyun was quot through Yonhap News Agency as saying Monday that despite the clash, Seoul ''will cling to the existing NLL as an effective maritime border.''

Jeong also reportedly said his ministry is trying to map not at home countermeasures to avert the the having recourse of the clash and will not be in a expedite in seeking to resume the stalled inter-Korean talks.

According to unconfirmed reporters, Kim and LaPorte also discussed revising military sways covering the process of firing at the enemy when threatened in order to minimize casualties and damage sustained in what is yet to be clashes.

Saturday's exchange of fire left four southward Korean sailors dead, individual missing and 19 wounded. toward the south Korea says at least 30 North Korean sailors are believed to have been killed or detrimented in the 25-minute clash.

A memorial service for the four southern Koreans was held Monday in a gymnasium of an army hospital in Seongnam, southern of Seoul, attended by means of about 500 people, including the bereaved families and former President Chun Doo Hwan.

Meanwhile, Pyongyang's official Korean Central moderns Agency reported Monday that U soldiers ''some days ago...seriously threatened our soldiers forward routine guard duty'' in the DMZ temporary peace town of Panmunjom.

It said the U soldiers threatened to use arms unles North Korean soldiers withdrew from their positions and ''behaved themselves disgracefully in effrontery of our soldiers in the joint security area.''

Accusing the U side of drawn out engaging in ''military provocations,'' the report warned, ''Not solitary military provocations against the other side if it be not that a trifling act of getting forward the nerves of soldiers forward duty in this area may immediately lead to a military clash.

''The U forces side appears to be forgetful that the merciless arms of our security officers in the area are always entirely ready to fire as they are upon highest alert,'' it said.

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