By Joori Roh and Chang-Ran Kim
SEUL/TOKYO (Reuters) – Allied warships are conducting defensive exercises after North Korean warplanes conducted an open bombing exercise on Thursday, South Korea’s Defense Ministry said. missiles.
The rare bombing exercise of at least eight North Korean warplanes and four bombers caused its southern neighbor to send 30 warplanes. Warplanes raided both sides of the fortified border amid heightened tensions from Pyongyang’s series of missile launches.
North Korea launched two short-range ballistic missiles into the sea on Thursday, just one hour after condemning the repositioning of the US aircraft carrier in the region and the UN Security Council meeting in New York.
Officials in Seoul and Washington said North Korea launched about 40 missiles this year, including its largest intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), and appears ready to conduct its first nuclear test since 2017.
The missile launch is the sixth in 12 days and the first since North Korea launched joint missile exercises with South Korea and North Korea on Tuesday by firing an intermediate-range missile (IRBM) at Japan.
“This is the sixth time in the short term, including only from late September,” Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida told reporters. “This is absolutely intolerable.”
A State Department spokesman said the United States condemned Thursday’s launch as a violation of United Nations Security Council resolutions and a threat to regional neighbors and the international community.
The United States and its allies have intensified military displays of force in the region, but the prospect of further international sanctions from the UN Security Council, which has already passed the Northern Court’s resolutions banning nuclear and missile development, seems slim.
In May, China and Russia vetoed a US-led initiative to impose more UN sanctions on North Korea over new ballistic missile tests, publicly splitting the Security Council for the first time since it began punishing Pyongyang with sanctions in 2006.
(Reporting by Joori Roh in Seoul and Chang-Ran Kim in Tokyo; additional reporting by David Brunnstrom in Washington)
source: Noticias
