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North Korea fires at least two unidentified projectiles North Korea fires at least two unidentified projectiles
(about 2 hours later)
North Korea has fired at least two unidentified projectiles early on Thursday from an area near Wonsan, on North Korea’s eastern coast, according to South Korea’s joint chiefs of staff. North Korea fired two “unidentified” projectiles into the sea on Thursday, South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said, after warnings from Pyongyang over military exercises between Washington and Seoul next month.
The projectiles flew about 430km (267 miles), the joint chiefs of staff said, but did not elaborate further. The North has warned the war games could affect the planned resumption of denuclearisation talks between Washington and Pyongyang.
This would be the first launching of projectiles reported since Donald Trump and North Korean leader, Kim Jong-un met at the demilitarised zone (DMZ) between the two Koreas at the end of June. The North “fired one unidentified projectile at 5.34am and the other at 5.57am, from Wonsan areas into the East Sea, and they flew around 430km (267 miles),” Seoul’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said in a statement. “Our military is closely monitoring the situation in case of additional launches and maintaining a readiness posture.”
North Korea’s last weapons testing was in May, which included both short-range missiles as well as smaller rockets. At the time, Kim oversaw the first flight of a previously untested weapon – a relatively small, fast missile experts believe will be easier to hide, launch and manoeuvre in flight. Kim Jong-un inspects new submarine, raising ballistic missile fears
On Tuesday, state news agency KCNA reported Kim inspected a large, newly built submarine, accompanied by missile programme leaders. It potentially signaled continued development of a submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) programme. In Washington a US official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said: “I can confirm that it was ... short-range.”
Denuclearisation talks between North Korea and the US have stalled after a second summit between the US president and Kim in Vietnam in February broke down. Pyongyang last fired short-range missiles on 9 May, a move US president Donald Trump called “very standard stuff” that, he said, had not affected his relationship with the North’s leader Kim Jong-un.
More details soon … Kim and Trump agreed to a resumption of dialogue at an impromptu meeting on 30 June they held in the demilitarized zone that divides the two Koreas.
Following that meeting, US secretary of state Mike Pompeo said working-level talks would probably start in mid-July. But last week, North Korea issued a warning over the military drills, which have been held for years and were scaled down to ease tensions with the nuclear-armed state.
The North condemned the exercises as “blatant pressure” and a “violation of the spirit” of the joint statement Trump and Kim signed at their first summit in Singapore last year.
The North even hinted it could reconsider its moratorium on nuclear testing because of the drills, although the US State Department had remained upbeat over commitments made by Kim and Trump during the DMZ encounter and at a February summit in Vietnam.
At their first summit in Singapore in June 2018 the two adopted a vaguely worded statement on “complete denuclearisation of the Korean peninsula” and agreed to “establish new US-DPRK relations”.
But the failure to reach an agreement over relief from US sanctions, and what the North was willing to give in return, led to the collapse of the leaders’ second summit in Hanoi.
Tensions rose in May, during the standstill in negotiations between Trump and Kim, when North Korea fired short-range missiles for the first time since November 2017.
“I don’t consider that a breach of trust at all. And, you know, at some point I may. But at this point no,” Trump said in an interview with Politico at the time.
Asked on Tuesday whether any meetings were scheduled with the North, Trump said: “No, we just have a very good relationship. And probably they would like to meet and we’ll see what happens.”
“There was a little correspondence recently, very positive correspondence with North Korea.”
He said there had been “no nuclear testing, there’s no missile testing, there’s no nothing.”
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