The launch also occurred hours after Park met with Chinese President Xi Jinping about North Korea. The missiles were launched “without giving any prior navigational warning”, a statement by the South Korean military said.
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North Korea fired three ballistic missiles off its east coast Monday, South Korea’s military said, in a show of force timed to the G-20 economic summit in China.
In early August, another Rodong missile fired by North Korea also traveled about 1,000 kilometers, the longest-ever flight by that missile. The summit was held in Hangzou, which is China’s eastern lake side city together with the Group of 20 advanced and growing economies of China.
The United Nations Security Council will discuss the latest missile launches by North Korea in a closed-door meeting on Tuesday morning at the request of the United States and Japan, diplomats said on Monday. President Barack Obama was to head to Laos on Monday evening.
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe approached Park during a coffee break at the G-20 and agreed to cooperate closely, according to Japan’s Foreign Ministry. But the test could strengthen the case in South Korea for deployment of a new USA missile defence system.
It comes just under two weeks after Pyongyang test-fired a submarine-launched ballistic missile.
This latest provocation from North Korea comes two months after the US and South Korea announced plans for an advanced missile defense system – the Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense system, or THAAD – to protect South Korea against an attack from the North.
North Korea “must halt all missile launches using ballistic missile technology and abandon its ballistic missile programmes in a complete, verifiable and irreversible manner”, the European union said in a statement.
The decision to suspend operations at Kaesong came shortly after North Korea conducted its fourth underground nuclear test on January 6 and a long-range rocket and satellite launch on February 6. “North Korea chose to launch the missile at this time in an attempt to interfere in the discussions about North Korea at the G20 summit”, Zheng Jiyong, director of the Center for Korean Studies at the Shanghai-based Fudan University, told the Global Times.
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During his meeting with South Korean President Park Geun-hye, Xi praised the “leapfrog development” of bilateral ties, saying China and the Republic of Korea should cherish their political mutual trust, safeguard the basis for bilateral cooperation, and overcome difficulties and challenges to put bilateral ties on the right track toward stable and healthy development.
