North Korea fired a ballistic missile into the East Sea on Saturday, days after South Korea demanded an apology over a mine blast that injured three of its soldiers in the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ).
South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said the missile was launched from the Wonsan area and travelled more than 700 kilometres. Seoul, the United States and Japan were sharing information on the launch and maintaining a joint defence posture, it said.
The launch followed a dispute over last month’s explosion inside the DMZ. South Korea and the US-led United Nations Command concluded that North Korean mines placed on the South Korean side of the border caused the blast.
North Korea has denied responsibility and rejected demands for an apology.
On Friday, Kim Yo Jong, sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, described South Korea as “really despicable” and dismissed Seoul’s call for dialogue as a “wild dream and unilateral jargon.”
South Korean President Lee Jae Myung had urged Pyongyang on Thursday to return to dialogue, while Unification Minister Chung Dong-young proposed talks on border issues.
Kim also warned that North Korea was “ready for anything” Seoul might do over the mine blast.
The latest launch has added to tensions along the border, with analysts viewing it as a rejection of Seoul’s diplomatic overtures.
“Seoul called for easing tensions, but Pyongyang answered by escalating them,” Yang Moo-jin, former president of the University of North Korean Studies in Seoul, told AFP.
The dispute comes as US President Donald Trump’s recent overtures to Pyongyang have raised concerns in Seoul that South Korea could be sidelined in potential nuclear negotiations with North Korea.
The opposition People Power Party also criticised Lee’s handling of the mine blast, saying South Korean soldiers had been injured without receiving an apology from Pyongyang.
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