North Korea fires long-range ballistic missile, South Korea says

SEOUL — North Korea fired a suspected long-range ballistic missile towards the sea off its east coast on Oct 31, South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff said, a day after Seoul reported the North was making preparations to launch an intercontinental ballistic missile.

The launch, at a sharply raised angle, was from an area near the North’s capital, Pyongyang, at 7.10am (6.10am Singapore time), the Joint Chiefs said in a statement. It did not confirm whether the missile had dropped.

"It is believed the North Korea ballistic missile is a long-range ballistic missile fired at a high angle," the Joint Chiefs of Staff said in a statement.

Earlier, the Japanese government said the missile was expected to land about 300km west of its Okushiri Island off its northern Hokkaido region, outside its exclusive economic zone and towards the Russian coast.

Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba later said there had been no reported damage from the launch.

Defence Minister Gen Nakatani said Japan strongly condemns the North’s action, which threatened not only Japan but also the international community. He said the flight time was likely the longest of North Korean missile launches and could be a new type of missile.

On Oct 30, South Korea’s Defence Intelligence Command said the North had placed a mobile launcher at a location making preparations to launch what could be an ICBM around the time of the US presidential election, which takes place on Nov 5.

North Korea has conducted a series of ICBM test launches at a sharply steep trajectory to let the projectiles drop within much shorter distances relative to the designed range, partly for safety and to avoid the political fallout of sending a missile far into the Pacific.

But a launch with a flatter, standard trajectory is considered essential for ICBM development to ensure the warhead is capable of making a re-entry into the atmosphere while maintaining control to hit an intended target.

The North last test launched an ICBM in December 2023, a projectile fuelled by solid-propellant and fired from a road launcher. That launch was also at a sharply raised angle and gave a flight time that could translate to a potential range of 15,000km on a normal trajectory.

North Korea has come under international condemnation after South Korea and the US said Pyongyang had dispatched 11,000 troops to Russia for deployment in the war in Ukraine, with 3,000 of them already moved close to the frontlines.

US Secretary of Defence Lloyd Austin and his South Korean counterpart Kim Yong-hyun condemned the deployment at a meeting in Washington on Oct 30.

North Korea’s move to make its troops co-belligerents fighting alongside the Russians has the potential to lengthen the already 2-½ year Ukraine conflict and draw in others, Austin said.

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