North Korea yesterday fired about 10 ballistic missiles to the sea toward Japan, the South Korean Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said, days after Pyongyang warned of “terrible consequences” over ongoing South Korea-US military drills.
Pyongyang recently dashed hopes of a diplomatic thaw with Seoul, Washington’s security ally, describing its latest peace efforts as a “clumsy, deceptive farce.”
Seoul’s military detected “around 10 ballistic missiles launched from the Sunan area in North Korea toward the East Sea [Sea of Japan] at around 1:20pm,” JCS said in a statement, referring to South Korea’s name for the body of water.
Photo: AP
The missiles flew a distance of about 350km, they said adding that South Korean and US authorities are analyzing their exact specifications.
The South’s military is ready to “respond overwhelmingly to any provocation,” the JCS added.
The Japanese Ministry of Defense also confirmed North Korea launched multiple ballistic missiles that reached a maximum altitude of about 80km and fell outside Japan’s exclusive economic zone near the Korean Peninsula’s east coast.
Seoul’s presidential Blue House condemned the launches as a “provocation that violates United Nations Security Council resolutions” and urged Pyongyang to immediately stop such acts.
It also ordered agencies to maintain readiness, as the launch occurred during the joint US-South Korea military drills.
The launches came hours after South Korean Prime Minister Kim Min-seok said that US President Donald Trump thinks a meeting with Pyongyang’s leader Kim Jong-un would be “good.”
Washington has for decades led efforts to dismantle North Korea’s nuclear program, but summits, sanctions and diplomatic pressure have had little impact.
The Trump administration has pushed in the past few months to revive high-level talks with Pyongyang, eyeing a possible summit with Kim Jong-un this year, potentially during Trump’s visit to Beijing at the end of this month.
Trump said during a trip to Asia in October last year that he was “100 percent” open to meeting with Kim Jong-un, a remark that went unanswered by the North.
After largely ignoring those overtures for months, Kim Jong-un recently said that the two nations could “get along” if Washington accepted Pyongyang’s nuclear status.
The number of the missiles launched yesterday was unusual, and that the timing was notable, analysts said.
“Global attention is currently focused on the war in the Middle East, and North Korea has historically carried out military provocations when it wants to draw attention to its presence,” Korea Institute for Military Affairs senior researcher Hong Sung-pyo said. “And that motive likely underlies this launch as well.”
Seoul and Washington on Monday started their springtime military drills “Freedom Shield,” which involves about 18,000 South Korean troops and runs until Thursday.
The nuclear-armed North, which attacked its neighbor in 1950 triggering the Korean War, has long described such exercises as rehearsals for invasion.
Earlier this week, Kim Yo-jong, a powerful confidante of her brother, Kim Jong-un, said the joint drills “may cause unimaginably terrible consequences.”
DETERRENCE: With 1,000 indigenous Hsiung Feng II and III missiles and 400 Harpoon missiles, the nation would boast the highest anti-ship missile density in the world With Taiwan wrapping up mass production of Hsiung Feng II and III missiles by December and an influx of Harpoon missiles from the US, Taiwan would have the highest density of anti-ship missiles in the world, a source said yesterday. Taiwan is to wrap up mass production of the indigenous anti-ship missiles by the end of year, as the Chungshan Institute of Science and Technology has been meeting production targets ahead of schedule, a defense official with knowledge of the matter said. Combined with the 400 Harpoon anti-ship missiles Taiwan expects to receive from the US by 2028, the nation would have
POSSIBILITIES EMERGE: With Taiwan’s victory and Japan’s narrow win over Australia, Taiwan now have a chance to advance if South Korea also beat the Aussies Taiwan has high hopes that the national baseball team would advance to the World Baseball Classic (WBC) quarter-finals after clinching a crucial 5-4 victory over South Korea in a nail-biting extra-inning game at the Tokyo Dome yesterday. Boosted by three home runs — two solo shots by Yu Chang (張育成) and Cheng Tsung-che (鄭宗哲) and a two-run homer by Stuart Fairchild — the triumph gave Taiwan a much-needed second victory in the five-team Pool C, where only the top two finishers would advance to the knockout stage in Miami, Florida. Entering extra innings with the game tied at four apiece, Taiwan scored
MISSION OF PEACE: The foreign minister urged Beijing to respect Taiwan’s existence as an independent nation, and work together to ensure peace and stability in the region Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) yesterday rejected Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi’s (王毅) comments about Taiwan, criticizing China as a “troublemaker” in the international community and a disruptor of cross-strait peace. Speaking at a news conference on the sidelines of the Chinese National People’s Congress, Wang said that Taiwan has always been a territory of China and that it would be impossible for it to become its own country. The “return” of Taiwan to China was the natural outcome of the Chinese people’s resistance against Japan in World War II, and that any pursuit of independence was “doomed
‘UNWAVERING FRIENDSHIP’: A representative of a Japanese group that co-organized a memorial, said he hopes Japanese never forget Taiwan’s kindness President William Lai (賴清德) yesterday marked the 15th anniversary of the Tohoku earthquake and tsunami, urging continued cooperation between Taiwan and Japan on disaster prevention and humanitarian assistance. Lai wrote on social media that Taiwan and Japan have always helped each other in the aftermath of major disasters. The magnitude 9 earthquake struck northeastern Japan on March 11, 2011, triggering a massive tsunami that claimed more than 19,000 lives, according to data from Japanese authorities. Following the disaster, Taiwan donated more than US$240 million in aid, making it one of the largest contributors of financial assistance to Japan. In addition to cash donations and
RSS