TOKYO and SEOUL – North Korea fired a suspected ballistic missile on Sunday afternoon, Japan and South Korea said.
Based on the flight time, the launch appears to have been a ballistic missile with a shorter range than the missiles recently tested, the Japanese Defense Ministry said.
South Korean officials said the missile was fired from the Pyongyang region into the East Sea shortly before 3 p.m. local time. According to the South Korean General Staff, it traveled about 1,000 km, or about 621 miles.
“We strongly condemn North Korea’s missile launch as a clear provocation that seriously threatens peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula,” the South Korean military said in a statement.
A television screen shows an archive image of North Korea's missile launch during a newscast at Seoul Station in Seoul, South Korea, Sunday, Jan. 14, 2024. Ahn Young-joon/AP
North Korea tested a long-range intercontinental missile last month with an estimated range of about 9,300 miles, Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said at the time, citing the missile's trajectory.
The missile fired on Sunday appeared to be a medium-range missile, South Korea said.
Japan and South Korea worked closely with the United States to analyze the launch, South Korea said.
In response to North Korea's missile launches, aggressive behavior and demonstrations of military strength, Japan, the United States and South Korea have significantly advanced military cooperation and made progress in overcoming past disputes.
The three countries have activated a real-time network for quickly and accurately sharing tracking data on North Korean missile threats.
This new operational capability was launched the day after the launch of North Korea's intercontinental ballistic missile (presumably solid-propelled Hwasong-18) in December and is intended to provide detailed data on missile launch points, trajectories and predicted impact points. Going beyond the previous restriction on exercises, authorities claim that the network will now operate continuously.
People watch a news broadcast on a television screen with archival footage of a North Korean missile test at a train station in Seoul on January 14, 2024. Jung Yeon-je/AFP via Getty Images
Kishida, who was on a trip to earthquake-hit Kanazawa on Sunday, said the government was reviewing the information and would provide information as soon as it knew more.
Japanese defense officials said the missile was fired from inside North Korea and took a northeasterly trajectory. They estimate that the rocket had a maximum altitude of over 30 miles and a flight distance of at least 310 miles.
This afternoon at 2:57 p.m., the Japanese Coast Guard sent out a warning that a North Korean missile had likely been fired. At around 3:11 p.m. they sent another message that the probable missile appeared to have crashed.
Ships were warned if they encountered debris from the crashed missile not to approach it and to alert the coast guard. The Coast Guard said it had received no information about possible damage to ships.
Japan said it believed the missile landed in the sea outside Japan's exclusive economic zone, which extends 200 nautical miles from the country's coast. The ministry said it was actively gathering further information on the incident.
According to TASS, a Russian state news service, the missile launch comes ahead of a planned visit to Russia by a senior North Korean diplomat.
North Korean Foreign Minister Choe Son Hui will begin a two-day diplomatic visit on January 15 at the invitation of Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, TASS reported, citing the North Korean Central News Agency.