North Korea fires long-range missile
SEOUL — North Korea on Saturday fired a longrange missile from its capital into the sea off Japan, according to its neighbors, a day after it threatened to take strong measures against South Korea and the U.S. over their joint military exercises.
According to the South Korean and Japanese militaries, the test missile was fired on a high angle, apparently to avoid reaching the neighbors’ territories, and traveled about 560 miles at a maximum altitude of 3,500 miles during an hourlong flight.
The details were similar to North Korea’s Hwasong-17 intercontinental ballistic missile test f light in November, which experts said demonstrated potential to reach the U.S. mainland if fired on a normal trajectory.
Japanese government spokesperson Hirokazu Matsuno said no damage was reported from the missile, which landed within Japan’s exclusive economic zone, about 125 miles west of Oshima island. Oshima lies off the western coast of the northernmost main island of Hokkaido.
North Korea’s Foreign Ministry on Friday threatened “unprecedently” strong action against its rivals, after South Korea announced a series of military exercises with the U.S. aimed at sharpening their potential response amid the North’s growing threats.
While the U.S. Indo-Pacific Command said the launch did not pose an immediate threat to U.S. personnel, territory or allies, the White House National Security Council said it needlessly raises tensions and risks destabilizing the security situation in the region.
“It only demonstrates that the DPRK continues to prioritize its unlawful weapons of mass destruction and ballistic missile programs over the well-being of its people,” it said, referring to North Korea by its formal name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, and calling the launch a “flagrant violation of multiple U.N. Security Council resolutions.”
The office of South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol said his national security director, Kim Sung-han, presided over an emergency security meeting that accused the North of escalating regional tensions. It denounced the government in Pyongyang for accelerating its nuclear arms development despite signs of worsening economic problems and food insecurity, saying such actions would bring only tougher international sanctions.
Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said his government was closely communicating with Washington and Seoul over the launch, which he called “an act of violence that escalates provocation toward the international order.”
The launch was North Korea’s first known testing activity since Jan. 1, when it test-fired a short-range weapon. It followed a massive military parade in Pyongyang earlier this month where troops rolled out more than a dozen ICBMs as leader Kim Jong Un watched from a balcony.
North Korea is coming off a record year in weapons demonstrations with more than 70 ballistic missiles fired.
Pyongyang has also conducted a slew of launches it described as simulated nuclear attacks against South Korean and U.S. targets in response to the allies’ resumption of large-scale joint military exercises that had been downsized for years.