Tokyo CNN –
According to Japanese public broadcaster NHK, North Korea may have fired several ballistic missiles that landed in the sea early Wednesday local time.
The broadcaster, citing the Japanese Coast Guard, reported that North Korea fired “what could be two ballistic missiles”. This came after the Japanese prime minister’s office said North Korea had launched a suspected ballistic missile.
NHK added, “According to Japanese government sources, the projectiles appear to have fallen into the Sea of Japan, outside the country’s Exclusive Economic Zone.”
A nuclear-capable US Navy ballistic-missile submarine made a port call in South Korea on Tuesday. The country’s Defense Ministry on Tuesday afternoon announced the presence of the Ohio-class ballistic missile submarine in the South Korean port city of Busan.
The submarine’s arrival and subsequent alleged launches on Wednesday are a result of a period of heightened tension in the peninsula. Last week, North Korea tested an allegedly advanced long-range missile and threatened to shoot down US military reconnaissance planes conducting so-called “enemy espionage activities” near its territory.
Kim Yo Jong, sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and herself a senior official, said in a statement Monday that deploying a US ballistic missile submarine to the peninsula would damage already broken lines of communication between the two sides .
South Korea and the US also held their first meeting of the Nuclear Consultative Group on Tuesday in Seoul, a joint body set up by the two countries’ leaders at a summit in Washington in April.