People watch a television screen showing a news broadcast with file footage of a North Korean missile test, at a railway station in Seoul on Jan. 30, 2022. North Korea launched its second ballistic missile of 2023 on Saturday, (JUNG YEON-JE/AFP/TNS)
CAMP HUMPHREYS, South Korea — North Korea launched its second missile of the year on Saturday, a long-range weapon fired eastward from Pyongyang, according to the South’s Joint Chiefs of Staff.
“The [South Korean] military is maintaining a full readiness posture” and is closely cooperating with the United States, the Joint Chiefs said in a message to reporters after the launch.
The missile, launched from the capital’s Sunan area, flew toward the East Sea, or Sea of Japan, around 5:22 p.m., the message said.
The Japanese Prime Minister’s Office tweeted that North Korea had launched a suspected ballistic missile and that it was taking “all possible measures for precaution … .”
South Korea’s Yonhap News Agency, citing anonymous military and intelligence officials, said the North likely fired an intercontinental ballistic missile. If confirmed, it would be the communist regime’s first ICBM since Nov. 18, when it fired a Hwasong-17 that landed less than 150 miles from Japanese territory.
North Korea fired one short-range ballistic missile on Jan. 1. It launched roughly 75 missiles in 36 separate days of testing in 2022, an annual record.
The latest launch comes four days before South Korea’s Ministry of National Defense is scheduled to participate in a tabletop exercise in Washington, D.C., that includes a scenario addressing the North’s nuclear threat.
On Friday, North Korea’s state-run Korean Central News Agency released a statement from the Foreign Ministry that warned the U.S.-South Korean military drills “seriously encroach upon the security interests” of the country and that the two allies “will face unprecedentedly persistent and strong counteractions.”
South Korea’s defense ministry on Thursday released its biennial defense report – the first under President Yoon Suk Yeol’s administration – that described the North as “our enemy.”
The comprehensive report included the latest details of North Korea’s military capabilities, such as the regime’s possession of 154 pounds of plutonium, up from 110 pounds in 2020.
