The Joint Chiefs of Staff of South Korea stated that the launch took place on Thursday morning but provided no more information, such as how far the weapon travelled.
The military of South Korea reported that North Korea launched a ballistic missile on Thursday toward its eastern waters. Six rounds of weapon launches by the North in less than two weeks led to criticism from the United States and other nations.
The Joint Chiefs of Staff of South Korea stated that the launch took place on Thursday morning but provided no more information, such as how far the weapon travelled.
The launch on Thursday comes two days after North Korea sent its first intermediate-range missile over Japan in five years. The missile fired on Tuesday, according to foreign experts, was an intermediate-range weapon capable of reaching Guam in the U.S. Pacific region and beyond.
After the United States held military exercises in the waters off the east coast of the Korean Peninsula with South Korea and Japan, the North conducted a flurry of recent weapons tests. Such manoeuvres are seen as a practise for an invasion by North Korea.
Following the launch on Tuesday, the U.S., Britain, France, Albania, Norway, and Ireland demanded that the U.N. Security Council convene in an emergency session.
In a statement released on Thursday, the North Korean Foreign Ministry expressed its vehement condemnation of “the Korean People’s Army on South Korea-U.S. joint drills raising the military tensions on the Korean Peninsula.”
This year, North Korea conducted a record number of missile launches despite years of delayed diplomatic efforts with the US. According to observers, North Korea wants to increase the size of its nuclear weapons in order to increase its negotiating power with the United States.
