(Updates with a statement from the North Korean leader’s sister)
Seoul, February 19 North Korean media reported today that the intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) the regime launched on Saturday was a Hwasong-15, the missile with the second-longest potential range in its arsenal that it first tested in 2017.
The North Korean military carried out a “sudden launch” of the missile, which fired at a steep angle, according to the KCNA news agency.
The General Missile Department was responsible for launching the missile from Sunan International Airport in Pyongyang, the state news agency said.
The trial, which took place on Saturday around 5:22 p.m. local time (8:22 a.m. GMT), “was organized suddenly without prior notification” on the basis of “an emergency order issued in the early hours of February 18”.
According to KCNA, the projectile traveled 989 kilometers for 4,015 seconds (1 hour and six minutes) and reached a peak of 5,768.5 kilometers, a figure consistent with what was detailed on Saturday by the South Korean and Japanese armies. .
Japanese Defense Minister Yasukazu Hamada said on Saturday that, launched on a normal trajectory, the missile could travel about 14,000 kilometers, enough to reach any part of the world except North America. South.
North Korea had only tested the Hwasong-15 once so far; It was in November 2017 amid an escalation of verbal threats between Pyongyang and US President Donald Trump.
The North Korean news agency text published today claims that the “military threats” from South Korea and the United States “are becoming serious, to the point that they cannot be ignored”.
Pyongyang on Friday threatened an “unprecedented” response to the annual spring military exercises that Seoul and Washington began finalizing in March and which the regime has called “preparations for a war of aggression”.
In addition, next week, the South Korean and US military will conduct a tabletop exercise at the Pentagon simulating a nuclear attack by the regime.
In a separate statement also released today by KCNA and signed by the North Korean leader’s sister, Kim Yo-jong, it is assured that Pyongyang will unleash a “very powerful and overwhelming” response to any hostile acts by allies.
Kim Jong-un’s sister states in the text that the United States “should cease all actions that threaten the security of our state and cease to tarnish the dignity of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (official name of the country) thinking always to themselves”. future security.
North Korea fired a record number of missiles last year, around 50, often in response to joint maneuvers by allies and the deployment of strategic US assets on the peninsula. ECE
asb/mmg