World News | North Korea Launches 2 Missiles to Sea as Allies Hold Drills
Get latest articles and stories on World at LatestLY. North Korea test-fired two short-range ballistic missiles in another show of force on Tuesday, a day after the United States and South Korea began military drills that Pyongyang views as an invasion rehearsal.
Seoul, Mar 14 (AP) North Korea test-fired two short-range ballistic missiles in another show of force on Tuesday, a day after the United States and South Korea began military drills that Pyongyang views as an invasion rehearsal.
The missiles launched from the southwestern coastal town of Jangyon flew across North Korea before landing in the sea off that country's east coast, South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff said in a statement. It said both missiles travelled about 620 kilometers (385 miles).
The reported flight distances suggest the missiles target South Korea, which hosts about 28,000 US troops. South Korea's military called the launches “a grave provocation” that undermines stability on the Korean Peninsula.
The US Indo-Pacific Command said Tuesday's launches don't pose an immediate threat to its allies. But it said the North's recent tests highlight the “destabilizing impact” of the North's unlawful weapons programs and that the US security commitment to South Korea and Japan remains “ironclad”.
Also Read | Hate Crime in US Increased by 12% in 2021, 64.5% Victims Targeted Over Race or Ancestry Bias: FBI Report.
Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida told reporters that officials were still gathering details of the North Korean launches and there were no immediate reports of damage in Japanese waters.
Pyongyang could further escalate its weapons tests over the coming days in a tit-for-tat response to the allies' military drills, which are planned to run until March 23. Last week, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un ordered his troops to be ready to repel what he called the “frantic war preparations moves” by his country's rivals.
Worries about North Korea's nuclear programme have grown sharply after the North test-fired more than 70 missiles in 2022, many of them nuclear-capable weapons, and openly threatened to use them in potential conflicts with the United States and South Korea.
North Korea appears to be using long-stalled talks with Washington and the expanding US-South Korean drills as a chance to enlarge its weapons arsenals to increase its leverage in future dealings with the United States.
The North Korean threats, along with China's increasing assertiveness, have pushed the US to seek to reinforce its alliances with South Korea and Japan. But some experts say a solidified Washington-Seoul-Tokyo cooperation could prompt Pyongyang, Beijing and Moscow to strengthen their own trilateral ties.
China and Russia, embroiled in separate confrontations with the US, have repeatedly blocked US and its allies' bids to toughen United Nations sanctions on North Korea.
Tuesday's launches were the North's second weapons test this week. On Monday, North Korea said it had test-fired two cruise missiles from a submarine the previous day. It implied the cruise missiles were being developed to carry nuclear warheads, though outside experts debate whether Pyongyang possesses functioning nuclear-armed missiles.
Submarine-launched missile systems are harder to detect and would provide the North retaliatory second attack capability. But experts say it would take years, extensive resources and major technological improvements for the heavily sanctioned nation to build a fleet of submarines that could travel quietly and reliably execute strikes.
US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said on Monday that North Korea has been refining its submarine-launch capabilities since its first test in 2016, and the United States was studying Sunday's launches to assess the North's capabilities.
“But of course, we're not going to let any steps North Korea takes deter us or constrain us from the actions that we feel are necessary to safeguard stability on the Korean Peninsula,” Sullivan said.
The US-South Korean joint exercises that started on Monday include computer simulations involving North Korean aggression and other security scenarios and field exercises.
The field exercises would return to the scale of the allies' biggest springtime exercises that were last held in 2018, according to South Korean defence officials.
The two countries have been expanding their drills as North Korean nuclear threats have been growing.
US-South Korea drills will proceed normally, regardless of whether “North Korea tries to disrupt them with provocations like missile launches,” Jeon Ha Gyu, spokesperson of South Korea's Defence Ministry, said on Tuesday.
US State Department spokesperson Ned Price said on Monday the United States has made clear it harbours no hostile intent toward North Korea and that the allies' longstanding exercises are “purely defensive in nature”.
Holding telephone talks for the second consecutive day to discuss the North Korean launches, the chief South Korean and US nuclear envoys stressed on Tuesday that the North would face “clear consequences” for its actions, without specifying what those would be.
They said the allies will maintain “firm readiness” to respond to any kind of North Korean provocation, according to Seoul's Foreign Ministry.
Later this week, South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol is to visit Tokyo for a summit with Kishida, where the North Korean threat is expected to be a major topic. The shared urgency over security is pushing Seoul and Tokyo closer together following years of disputes stemming from Japan's colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula before the end of World War II. (AP)
(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from Syndicated News feed, LatestLY Staff may not have modified or edited the content body)