Wednesday (October 2): North Korea has fired two missiles into the sea today.
The fire comes a day after US and North Korea announced they would resume stalled nuclear talks later this week.
Pyongyang tested what it called a “super-large” rocket launcher last month just hours after Choe released a statement saying that the North was willing to resume working-level talks with Washington.
One of the projectiles fell into waters within Japan’s exclusive economic zone, Tokyo said, and although the type of weapon was not clear, previous tests have been identified as short-range ballistic missiles.
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said Tokyo would hold a meeting of the National Security Council to decide how to respond to the firing.
“The launching of ballistic missiles violates UN Security Council resolutions and we strongly protest and strongly condemn it,” Abe told reporters.
The South’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said the projectiles were fired from Wonsan into the East Sea (Sea of Japan).
“Our military is monitoring the situation for additional launches and maintaining a readiness posture,” they said in a statement, without providing further details.
The launch came a day after the North’s Vice Foreign Minister Choe Son Hui said Pyongyang had agreed to hold working-level talks with Washington later this week.
The two sides will have “preliminary contact” on Friday and hold negotiations the following day, Choe said in a statement carried by the official Korean Central News Agency.
“It seems North Korea wants to make its negotiating position quite clear before talks even begin,” Harry Kazianis of the Center for the National Interest in Washington said after Wednesday’s launch.
“Pyongyang seems set to push Washington to back off from past demands of full denuclearisation for what are only promises of sanctions relief,” he added.
It is not the first time the North has followed up an offer of talks with a weapons test.
