North Korea‘s front-line troops have completed their preparation for military action against South Korea, Pyongyang’s state media said Friday, as the North‘s leader has declared a “quasi-state of war.”

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un ordered the country’s front-line military to have full combat readiness against South Korea at an emergency meeting of the central military commission of the Workers‘ Party, following the North’s firing of artillery shells across the heavily fortified border.

“The Korean People‘s Army (KPA) front-line large combined units entered into a wartime state all at once, fully armed to launch surprise operations, and wound up their preparedness for action,” the North’s Korean Central News Agency said in an English-language dispatch.

It said that North Korean soldiers are waiting for “an order of attack” to destroy its enemy, warning that means for psychological warfare by the South are “within the sight of the KPA‘s multiple rocket launchers and tactical and strategic rocket forces.”

Heightened cross-border tension came as the North fired shells at a South Korean front-line military unit on Thursday afternoon, which prompted South Korean troops to respond with artillery fire.

No casualties were reported. (Yonhap)