The United Nations Security Council will discuss the latest missile launches by North Korea in a closed-door meeting at the request of the United States and Japan, diplomats say.
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“Today’s reckless launches by North Korea threaten civil aviation and maritime commerce in the region”, State Department spokesman John Kirby said on Monday.
In June, after a string of failures, North Korea sent an intermediate Musudan missile more than 870 miles high in a test launch that outside analysts said showed progress in efforts to acquire the ability to strike United States forces in the region.
Japan’s Defense Minister Tomomi Inada said the launch was a “serious threat” to the country’s security, adding that it was clear North Korea was learning from past failures.
“Looking at the fact that the three missiles have landed on nearly the same spot at nearly the same time, I think their missile technology has substantially improved”, she said.
“All I can say about North Korea is that no president has handed to his successor a better situation on North Korea than they inherited, because North Korea just keeps blowing through every agreement”, says Michael Green, a former director for Asian Affairs at the National Security Council under President George W. Bush and now an Asia analyst at the Center for Strategic and International Security Studies (CSIS) in Washington.
North Korea regularly engages in missile and rocket tests, especially when global attention is turned to Northeast Asia.
The launching of the trio of Rodong mid-range missiles yesterday from Hwangju county in North Korea’s east coast around noon local time (11am Singapore time) drew condemnation from the USA and its allies, South Korea and Japan.
It fired a submarine-launched missile on Aug 24 that flew about 500km towards Japan, a show of improving technological capability for the isolated country.
That missile entered Japan’s air defense identification zone, the first time that has happened.
Earlier in the day, South Korean President Park Geun-hye held talks with her Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping on the sidelines of the G20 summit in Hangzhou, after months of frayed Seoul-Beijing ties due to China’s public opposition to the planned deployment in the South of an American anti-missile system, Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD). President Barack Obama was in China meeting with the leaders of France and Germany around the time of the launch.
The latest firing won’t help the push by Chinese President Xi Jinping to get Park to scrap the planned deployment of a powerful US anti-missile system in the South.
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. Recently, North Korea conducted a test of a submarine-launched ballistic missile. It called them “grave violations” of a ban on all ballistic missile activity.
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Meanwhile, China’s Xinhua news agency says President Xi told his South Korean counterpart that Beijing opposes deployment of the US -built THAAD (Terminal High Altitude Area Defense) anti-missile system in South Korea.
