The launch came a day after USA and South Korean military officials said they are ready to deploy an advanced USA missile defence system in South Korea to cope with North Korean threats.
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North Korea said it sees the sanctions imposed Wednesday by the United States as an “open declaration of war” against Pyongyang and if they are not removed it threatened to take “the toughest countermeasures”.
“We strongly condemn North Korea’s missile test in violation of U.N. Security Council Resolutions, which explicitly prohibit North Korea’s use of ballistic missile technology”, said Gabrielle Price, spokeswoman for the U.S. State Department’s Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs.
North Korea has test-fired a ballistic missile from a submarine but it failed in its initial flight stage, South Korea’s military says.
Since April, the DPRK made several launches of ballistic missiles into waters of the Sea of Japan.
Talks between Seoul and Washington on the THAAD deployment picked up after North Korea conducted its fourth nuclear test in January.
North Korea’s official Korean Central News Agency said Seoul’s plan is a provocation to push the situation on the Korean Peninsula to the worst possible. These missiles can reach targets in South Korea and Japan. But he said the debate over North Korea among senior Chinese leaders would probably be reshaped, with officials who favor better relations with Pyongyang gaining more influence.
North Korea acquiring the ability to launch missiles from submarines would be an alarming development for its neighbours because missiles from submerged vessels are harder to detect in advance.
So if China or Russian Federation counter-attack with missiles, the THAAD system can inform the United States about the launch, thus, providing extra time for the U.S. to intercept.
The U.S. Treasury Department said the sanctions targeting Kim, 10 other North Korean officials and five entities are as a result of their role in “notorious” human rights abuses.
North Korea has already been sanctioned heavily because of its nuclear weapons programme.
China’s foreign minister said Saturday that THAAD exceeded the security needs of the Korean peninsula.
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It said any problem arising in relation with the United States would be handled under its “wartime law”.
