The U.N. Security Council in late August strongly condemned four North Korean ballistic missile launches in July and August.
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The missiles were fired from a western region south of the capital Pyongyang, said the statement by South Korea’s Office of Joint Chiefs of Staff.
The three missiles flew more than 600 miles and landed almost 250 miles inside Japan’s air defense zone, South Korean officials said.
Japan’s defense ministry said the three missiles are estimated to have fallen into the country’s Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) in the Sea of Japan, according to a statement.
South Korean President Park Geun-hye told her Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, that North Korea’s behavior this year has “seriously undermined peace in this region and posed a challenge to the development of the South Korea-China relations”, RT reported.
North Korea has been banned from conducting missile tests, but that hasn’t stopped them from launching several lately.
In early August, another Rodong missile fired by North Korea also traveled about 1,000 kilometers, the longest-ever flight by that missile.
North Korea is barred from testing nuclear or ballistic missile technology, but recent months have seen it carry out a string of missile tests.
The launches, coming as the G-20 meeting continued in the eastern Chinese city of Hangzhou and just days before North Korea marks the 68th anniversary of the formation of its government, constituted an “armed protest”, a South Korean military spokesman said.
Park acknowledged Xi’s concerns on the deployment of THAAD in Hangzhou, but reiterated South Korea’s threat perception from North Korea.
“This is Pyongyang’s way of reminding everyone of their existence at a moment when all the parties are together, in a typically defiant, North Korean way”, John Delury, assistant professor at Yonsei University in South Korea, told CNN.
During the meeting, Xi reaffirmed China’s commitment to realising the denuclearization of the Korean peninsula, China’s state news agency Xinhua reported Monday.
The missile, fired from off the northeastern port of Sinpo, flew 500 kilometres (around 300 miles) towards Japan, far exceeding the range of the North´s previous sub-launched missiles.
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President Park explained Seoul’s need to protect itself from North Korea’s escalating missile and nuclear threats – and that there would be no reason for THAAD if such threats did not exist.
