North Korea has fired what is suspected to be a ballistic missile on Tuesday morning, January 11, 2022.
Japan and South Korea said this was less than a week after Pyongyang tested what it said was a hypersonic weapon.
Launch of the suspicious missile was detected by Japan and South Korea and comes after six countries urged Pyongyang to end “destabilising” actions.
In a statement released by Seoul’s Joint Chiefs of Staff read, “Our military detected a suspected ballistic missile fired by North Korea from land towards the East Sea at around 7.27am (22:27 GMT on Monday) today,”
The launch was also reported by Japan’s coast guard, which said the North had fired a “ballistic missile-like object”.
Kyodo news agency in a report, cited government sources in Tokyo that the projectile appeared to have landed outside Japan’s Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ).
“That North Korea continues to launch missiles is extremely regrettable,” Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida told reporters.
South Korea’s national security council, in an emergency meeting, expressed “strong regret” over the test, the presidential Blue House noted.
The latest launch comes after six countries, including the United States and Japan, urged nuclear-armed North Korea to end “destabilising actions” ahead of a United Nations Security Council closed-door meeting to discuss last week’s test.
The US Ambassador to the United Nations, Linda Thomas-Greenfield in a statement on Monday noted that these actions will increase risk of miscalculation and escalation, posing a significant threat to regional stability.
“North Korea makes these military investments at the expense of the wellbeing of the North Korean people.”
Discussions regarding denuclearisation has been stalled since a flurry of summitry between North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and former US President Donald Trump collapsed in 2019.
Thomas-Greenfield reiterated calls for North Korea to return to talks and abandon its missiles and nuclear weapons.
“Our goal remains the complete, verifiable, and irreversible denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula,” she said.
Pyongyang is banned from testing all kinds of ballistic and nuclear weapons tests by the United Nations and subject to UN sanctions.
North Korea’s state media said last Thursday that it had launched a hypersonic missile, adding that the weapon had successfully hit a target. The launch had been detected by Japan and South Korea the day before.
Kim Jong Un has said he is committed to modernising the North’s military. This was after previous claims by the country to have tested a hypersonic missile last September.
Unlike ballistic missiles that fly into outer space before returning on steep trajectories, hypersonic weapons fly towards targets at lower altitudes and can move at more than five times the speed of sound – or about 6,200 kilometres per hour (3,850 miles per hour).
In 2021, North Korea also tested what it said was a new type of submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM), a long-range cruise missile, and a weapon launched from a train.
North Korea insists negotiations can only resume when the US and other countries end what it considers “hostile” policies.
However, the military’s advances have come as the economy has come under increasing pressure not just from sanctions, but strict border closures as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic.
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