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Tag: north and south korea conflict

  • North Korea fires two ballistic missiles, South Korea and Japan say | CNN

    North Korea fires two ballistic missiles, South Korea and Japan say | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    North Korea fired two short-range ballistic missiles from the Munchon area of Kangwon Province to the waters off the peninsula’s eastern coast, South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff told reporters on Sunday.

    The missiles were launched between 1:47 a.m. and 1:53 a.m. local time Sunday, according to Japan’s State Minister of Defense Toshiro Ino.

    Both missiles fell outside Japan’s Exclusive Economic Zone, Ino added.

    The first missile is estimated to have flown about 350 kilometers, or 217 miles, at a maximum altitude of approximately 100 kilometers, or 62 miles, according to Ino. The second traveled about the same distance.

    Ino noted there were no reports of damages to vessels at sea, but the defense ministry is still analyzing the details and investigating what kind of missiles were launched, including the possibility they were submarine-launched ballistic missiles.

    South Korea’s military has strengthened its surveillance and vigilance and maintaining a full readiness posture while closely cooperating with the US, the country’s joint chiefs of staff said.

    This is the 25th missile launch this year, according to CNN’s count, which includes both ballistic and cruise missiles. The last launch occurred Thursday when North Korea fired two short-range ballistic missiles, the latest in a spate of launches in the past two weeks.

    Japan’s Coast Guard instructed vessels to pay attention to information and to not approach any objects which have fallen in the sea. It also asked vessels to report any relevant information.

    On Tuesday, North Korea fired another missile, without warning, which flew over and past Japan, causing Japan to warn its citizens to take shelter.

    The missile Tuesday traveled over northern Japan early in the morning, and is believed to have landed in the Pacific Ocean. The last time North Korea fired a ballistic missile over Japan was in 2017.

    US Indo-Pacific Command said Saturday the latest launches do “not pose an immediate threat to US personnel or territory, or to our allies.”

    “We are aware of the two ballistic missile launches and are consulting closely with our allies and partners,” the command said in a statement. “The missile launch highlights the destabilizing impact of the DPRK’s unlawful WMD and ballistic missile programs. The US commitments to the defense of the Republic of Korea and Japan remain ironclad.”

    US Secretary of State Antony Blinken warned if North Korea continues “down this road” of provocation following its ballistic missile launch Tuesday, “it will only increase the condemnation, increase the isolation and increase the steps that are taken in response to their actions.”

    The US imposed new sanctions Friday, following North Korean recent ballistic missile tests, the US Treasury and State Department said.

    North Korea usually fires its missiles into waters off the coast of the Korean Peninsula, making Tuesday’s flight over Japan considerably more provocative.

    The aggressive acceleration in weapons testing has sparked alarm in the region, with the US, South Korea and Japan responding with missile launches and joint military exercises. The US has also redeployed an aircraft carrier into waters near the peninsula, a move South Korean authorities called “very unusual.”

    Japan issued a strong protest against North Korea through its embassy in Beijing, Ino said.

    On Thursday, US, South Korean and Japanese warships performed a missile defense exercise in the Sea of Japan, the US-Indo Pacific Command said in a statement.

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  • US and South Korea test-fire missiles in continued response after North Korea launch | CNN

    US and South Korea test-fire missiles in continued response after North Korea launch | CNN

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    Seoul, South Korea
    CNN
     — 

    The United States and South Korea launched four missiles off the east coast of the Korean Peninsula on Wednesday morning local time, according to South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff.

    The test was the allies’ second exercise in under 24 hours, following a provocative test-launch Tuesday morning by neighboring North Korea, which fired a ballistic missile without warning over Japan in a significant escalation of its weapons testing program.

    The US and South Korea initially responded to the provocation with a precision bombing exercise on Tuesday, which involved a South Korean F-15K fighter jet firing two air-to-surface munitions at a virtual target in a firing range west of the Korean Peninsula, per the South Korean Joint Chiefs.

    The allies typically respond to missile tests by North Korea with military exercises.

    Wednesday’s launch included four ATACMS missiles, the statement by the South Korean Joint Chiefs said. Also known as Army Tactical Missile Systems, such weapons are surface-to-surface missiles that can fly around 200 miles (320 kilometers).

    According to John Kirby, the National Security Council coordinator for strategic communications, the launch was designed to demonstrate that the US and its allies have “the military capabilities at the ready to respond to provocations by the North.”

    “This is not the first time we’ve done this in response to provocations by the North to make sure that we can demonstrate our own capabilities,” Kirby told CNN’s Pamela Brown on the “The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer.”

    “We want to see the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, (North Korean leader Kim Jong Un) hasn’t shown an inclination to move in that direction, quite frankly he’s moving in the opposite direction by continuing to conduct these missile tests which are violations of security council resolutions,” he added.

    On Tuesday, the US and Japan also conducted a joint response to the North Korean launch, with US Marine Corps and Japan Air Self-Defense Force fighter jets flying over the Sea of Japan, also known as the East Sea.

    Following a 25-minute phone call with US President Joe Biden, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said North Korea’s latest launch posed “a grave challenge to peace and the stability of Japan, the region and the international community” and that Biden shared this view completely.

    Analysts say there’s little the US and its allies can do to stop Kim’s relentless weapons buildup.

    “The North Koreans are in no mood to talk. They’re in the mood of testing and blowing things off,” said Jeffrey Lewis, director of the East Asia Nonproliferation Project at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies.

    Failed US-North Korea summits during the Trump administration have led Kim to believe he can gain nothing from talks, Lewis said.

    Since 2019 negotiations with former US President Donald Trump were cut short with no agreement, the North Korean leader has laid out a program to develop missiles with nuclear capability – and he’s following that timetable, Lewis added.

    “North Korea is going to keep conducting missile tests until the current round of modernization is done. I don’t think a nuclear (test) explosion is far behind,” Lewis said.

    Kirby, the National Security Council spokesperson, said North Korea is making progress.

    Every time the Kim regime launches a weapon, “They learn, they get better, they get more capable,” he said in an interview with Fox News on Tuesday.

    Ankit Panda, senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said North Korea appeared set on a course to develop nuclear weapons.

    “Denuclearization is now I think in the dustbin of history as a failed policy,” he said.

    “There is simply no practical plan at this point, especially in the short term, to bring North Korea to the negotiating table and to pursue denuclearization.”

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  • Japan issues rare alert as North Korea fires missile without warning over main island | CNN

    Japan issues rare alert as North Korea fires missile without warning over main island | CNN

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    Seoul, South Korea
    CNN
     — 

    Japan urged residents to take shelter early Tuesday morning after North Korea fired a ballistic missile without warning over the country for the first time in five years, in a major and potentially dangerous escalation of recent weapons tests by the Kim Jong Un regime.

    The launch, which prompted immediate backlash from Tokyo and Seoul, comes amid a spate of missile tests, with five launches in the past 10 days, and follows renewed military drills between the United States and its regional allies.

    The intermediate-range missile was launched from Mupyong-ri near North Korea’s central border with China at around 7:23 a.m. local time, according to South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS). It flew about 4,600 kilometers (2,858 miles) for 20 minutes at an estimated maximum altitude of 1,000 kilometers (621 miles) over Japan’s Tohoku region on the main island of Honshu before falling into the Pacific Ocean, some 3,000 kilometers (1,864 miles) from the country’s shore, Japanese officials said.

    Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida strongly condemned the launch and called North Korea’s recent ballistic missile launches “outrageous” in comments to reporters at his official residence.

    Tuesday’s launch is the country’s 23rd such missile test this year, including both ballistic and cruise missiles.

    There were no reports of damage to aircraft or vessels near the missile trajectory, according to Japanese authorities, but the unannounced missile triggered a rare J-alert, a system designed to inform the public of emergencies and threats in Japan.

    In such emergencies, alerts are sent out via sirens, through community radio stations and to individual smartphone users. On Tuesday, alerts were sent out at around 7:30 a.m. local time to people in Aomori prefecture, Hokkaido and Tokyo’s Izu and Ogasawara islands, according to Japanese officials.

    A tweet posted by Japan’s Prime Minister’s office urged residents to take shelter in buildings and to “not approach anything suspicious that is found and to immediately contact the police or fire department.”

    Other governments were quick to decry the launch, with South Korea’s President Yoon Suk Yeol branding it a “reckless” provocation, adding that North Korea will face a decisive response from the South Korean military and its allies.

    The White House also “strongly condemned” the test, with National Security Council spokesperson Adrienne Watson calling it a “destabilizing” action that shows North Korea’s “blatant disregard for United Nations Security Council resolutions and international safety norms.”

    Kim Seung-kyum, chief of South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS), and Paul LaCamera, the United States Forces Korea commander, held a meeting after the launch and reaffirmed the combined defense posture will be further strengthened against any threats and provocations from North Korea, the JCS said.

    The US Indo-Pacific Command also released a statement saying American commitments to the defense of Japan and South Korea “remain ironclad.”

    Ankit Panda, a senior fellow in the Nuclear Policy Program at the Washington-based Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said regular missile testing was was part of North Korea’s plan to maintain its nuclear forces.

    “It is quite possible that the United States, South Korea and Japan will take away a message from this missile test that North Korea is continuing to assert itself to show that it has the ability to deliver nuclear weapons to targets including the US territory of Guam,” he said, adding that “risk reduction” to stop a crisis from escalating should be the current priority.

    “If such a crisis were to play out, it would play out under a significantly more advanced North Korean nuclear capability, which I think would significantly limit the options that the United States and South Korea would have, potentially to retaliate or manage escalation with North Korea,” he said.

    Tuesday’s launch could herald an intensification of provocations by North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, experts told CNN.

    “Pyongyang is still in the middle of a provocation and testing cycle and is likely waiting until after China’s mid-October Communist Party Congress to conduct an even more significant test,” said Leif-Eric Easley, associate professor of international studies at Ewha Womans University in Seoul.

    “The Kim regime is developing weapons such as tactical nuclear warheads and submarine-launched ballistic missiles as part of a long-term strategy to outrun South Korea in an arms race and drive wedges among US allies.”

    Four previous missile launches occurred in the space of a week in late September and early October, around the same time US Vice President Kamala Harris made an official visit to Japan and South Korea, and as US, Japanese and South Korean navies held joint exercises.

    North Korea’s tests also come as international attention remains firmly focused on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine – and as both Moscow and Beijing appear reluctant to side with the West to further censure Pyongyang.

    In May, Russia and China vetoed a US-drafted United Nations Security Council resolution to strengthen sanctions on North Korea for its weapons testing, in a vote the US said was likely to fuel Pyongyang’s program to develop nuclear-capable missile systems.

    Washington and the International Atomic Energy Agency have both warned this year that North Korea may be preparing for a nuclear test, which would be its first since 2017.

    Jeffrey Lewis, director of the East Asia Nonproliferation Program at the Middlebury Institute, drew a connection between the missile tests and a potential nuclear test.

    “North Korea is going to keep conducting missile tests until the current round of modernization is done. I don’t think a nuclear (test) explosion is far behind,” he told CNN.

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