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North Korea Launches Ballistic Missile Into Sea
| Wall Street Journal | - |
SEOUL—North
Korea fired a midrange ballistic missile into the sea early Friday as
it continues annual military exercises and protests new U.S.
ENLARGE
North Korean leader
Kim Jong Un watches the ballistic rocket launch drill of the Strategic
Force of the Korean People's Army at an unknown location, in this
undated photo released by North Korea's Korean Central News Agency in
Pyongyang on March 11, 2016. North Korea fired a ballistic missile on
March 18, 2016 that flew about 800 km (500 miles) off its east coast
into the sea, South Korea's military said, days after fresh U.S.
sanctions were imposed on the isolated state.
Photo:
Reuters
The missile was launched from an area northwest of Pyongyang at 5:55 a.m. local time and flew about 800 kilometers (500 miles) before crashing into the sea off the Korean Peninsula’s eastern coast, a spokesman for Seoul’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said.
Military officials said that the projectile was likely one of North Korea’s Rodong-type missiles and appeared to have been fired from a mobile launcher. The last test firing of a Rodong missile was in 2014, they said.
North Korea fired another projectile from the same area around 20 minutes later but it disappeared from radar screens shortly after launch, the officials said. Further analysis is needed to conclude whether it broke up or there was an error in the radar system, they said.
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry issued a statement condemning the launches.
“We call again on North Korea to refrain from actions that further raise tensions in the region and focus instead on taking concrete steps toward fulfilling its international commitments and obligations,” he said.
North Korea is barred from testing ballistic missiles and nuclear explosives under United Nations’ resolutions, but leader Kim Jong Un recently pledged to continue testing both.
North Korea also fired two short-range ballistic missiles into the sea on March 10. Test-firings of missiles are common during North Korea’s annual winter military-drill period and are also viewed as acts of defiance against military exercises that take place in South Korea at the same time.
Pyongyang has also responded with militaristic rhetoric to new sanctions imposed by the United Nations for its January nuclear bomb test and February long-range rocket launch. The U.S.-led sanctions have been accompanied by separate penalties imposed by Washington, Seoul and others intended to block North Korea’s development of nuclear weapons.
Write to Alastair Gale at alastair.gale@wsj.com and Kwanwoo Jun at kwanwoo.jun@wsj.com
