Seoul: N. Korea fires suspected ICBM and 2 other missiles

SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea test-launched a suspected intercontinental ballistic missile and two shorter-range weapons toward its eastern waters Wednesday, South Korea said, hours after President Joe Biden ended a trip to Asia where he reaffirmed the U.S. commitment to defend its allies in the face of the North’s nuclear threat.

The suspected ICBM didn’t fly its full range. But if confirmed, it would still be North Korea’s first test of an ICBM system in about two months amid stalled nuclear diplomacy with the United States. The launch suggests North Korea is determined to continue its efforts to modernize its arsenal despite its first COVID-19 outbreak, which has caused outside worries about a humanitarian disaster.

“North Korea’s sustained provocations can only result in stronger and faster South Korea-U.S. combined deterrence and can only deepen North Korea’s international isolation,” the South Korean government said in a statement after an emergency security meeting.

Japanese Defense Minister Nobuo Kishi called the launches “an act of provocation and absolutely impermissible.”

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken held separate calls with his counterparts from South Korea and Japan during which they condemned the launches as a clear violation of multiple U.N. Security Council resolutions, the State Department said.

Blinken noted Washington’s commitment to the defense of South Korea and Japan “remains ironclad” as the three allies continue to cooperate to achieve the complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, the statement said.

U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric said the launch of the three missiles “only contributes to increasing regional and international tensions” and reiterated U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres’ call on North Korea to comply with U.N. Security Council resolutions, which ban such tests.