TOKYO ROCKET SCARE

Subway shut down after NK missile test

Tokyo’s subway system was briefly shut down Saturday as a safety precaution after North Korea test-fired a missile in defiance of a US push for new global sanctions.

The test of the missile — which was not carrying a nuclear warhead — failed, but tension mounted as the United States and South Korea began military drills.

President Trump said he “will not be happy’’ if Pyongyang tests a nuclear weapon.

Asked in an interview with CBS’s “Face the Nation,’’ which will air Sunday, if he’d respond with military force, Trump said, “I don’t know. We’ll see.’’

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe called North Korea’s move Saturday “absolutely unacceptable.”

“There is a major crisis looming over the peace and prosperity of the world,” he said in London at the end of a three-day visit to Russia and Britain. “The international community must display solidarity.”

Abe added that he agreed with Russian President Vladimir Putin that Russia, China, Japan, the United States and South Korea all need to cooperate closely on the issue.

The subway shutdown was the first on the Tokyo Metro under new rules calling for safety checks in re- sponse to news of the launching of any missile that could hit Japan.

The trains were stopped about a half-hour after the launch and at the beginning of the annual Golden Week, a series of national holidays.

North Korea fired its missile hours after US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson warned the UN Security Council of “catastrophic consequences” if other nations, particularly China, fail to pressure the North into abandoning its weapons program.

China is thought to have leverage over North Korea because it accounts for 90 percent of the isolated nation’s trade.

Also, the president of the Philippines called on the US not to play into the hands of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, who “wants to end the world.”

Meanwhile Saturday, the USS Carl Vinson aircraft carrier kicked off a joint drill with the South Korean navy.

The drill is intended to verify the allies’ capability to track and intercept enemy missiles, a Navy spokesman said. The drill will also include a live-fire exercise and anti-submarine maneuvers, the spokesman added.

Trump has warned of a possible “major conflict” with North Korea, and he insists that “all options are on the table” to stop its nuclear drive.