South Korea says Pyongyang fired around 10 ballistic missiles

SEOUL – North Korea fired about 10 ballistic missiles towards the Sea of Japan on March 14, Seoul’s Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said, days after Pyongyang warned of “terrible consequences” over South Korea-US military drills.

Pyongyang recently dashed hopes of a diplomatic thaw with South Korea, Washington’s security ally, describing its latest peace efforts as a “clumsy, deceptive farce”.

Seoul’s military detected “around 10 unidentified ballistic missiles launched from the Sunan area in North Korea towards the East Sea at around 1.20pm”, the JCS said in a statement, referring to South Korea’s name for the body of water.

The missiles flew a distance of around 350km, it said, adding that South Korean and the US authorities are analysing their exact specifications.

The South Korean military is ready to “respond overwhelmingly to any provocation”, JCS added.

Japan’s Defence Ministry also confirmed North Korea launched multiple ballistic missiles that reached a maximum altitude of about 80km and fell outside Japan’s exclusive economic zone near the Korean peninsula’s east coast.

Seoul’s presidential Blue House condemned the launches as a “provocation that violates United Nations Security Council resolutions” and urged Pyongyang to immediately stop such acts.

It also ordered relevant agencies to maintain heightened readiness as the launch occurred during the joint US-South Korea military drills.

The JCS announcement came hours after South Korean Prime Minister Kim Min-seok said that US President Donald Trump thinks a meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un would be “good”.

Washington has for decades led efforts to dismantle North Korea’s nuclear programme, but summits, sanctions and diplomatic pressure have had little impact.

The Trump administration has pushed in recent months to revive high-level talks with Pyongyang, eyeing a possible summit with the North Korean leader in 2026, potentially during Mr Trump’s April visit to Beijing.

Mr Trump said during a trip to Asia in October that he was “100 per cent” open to meeting with Mr Kim, a remark that went unanswered by Pyongyang.

After largely ignoring those overtures for months, the North Korean leader recently said that the two nations could “get along” if Washington accepted Pyongyang’s nuclear status.

‘Terrible consequences’

Analysts said the number of missiles launched on March 14 is unusual and that the timing is notable.

“Global attention is currently focused on the war in the Middle East and North Korea has historically carried out military provocations when it wants to draw attention to its presence,” Dr Hong Sung-pyo, a senior researcher at the Korea Institute for Military Affairs, told AFP.

“And that motive likely underlies this launch as well,” he added.

Seoul and Washington on March 9 kicked off their springtime military drills called Freedom Shield that will involve about 18,000 Korean troops and run until March 19.

The nuclear-armed North – which attacked its neighbour in 1950, triggering the Korean War – has long described such exercises as rehearsals for invasion.

Earlier this week, Ms Kim Yo Jong, a powerful confidante of her brother Mr Kim, said the joint drills “may cause unimaginably terrible consequences”.

She went on to say that the drills are taking place at “a critical time when global security structure is collapsing rapidly and wars break out in different parts of the world”.

She said the situation is caused by “the reckless acts of the outrageous international rogues”.

Pyongyang has condemned the US-Israeli attack on Iran as an “illegal act of aggression”, claiming that it shows the “rogue” nature of the United States.

North Korea also recently carried out missile tests from the naval destroyer Choe Hyon, claiming the country is in the process of “arming the navy with nuclear weapons”.

“North Korea has been devoting greater resources to its navy, with possible support from Russia. But Kim will have noticed that the US was able to sink most of the Iranian navy within a week,” said Dr Leif-Eric Easley, a professor at Ewha University in Seoul.

“So Pyongyang is likely to conduct tests and issue rhetoric about nuclear command, control and delivery systems to suggest it could inflict unacceptable harm if its naval forces come under attack.” AFP