2023-12-18 07:01:19
Passersby watch a South Korean news program broadcasting an image of a North Korean missile launch, on a screen at Seoul Station, December 18, 2023. AHN YOUNG-JOON / AP
North Korea fired a long-range ballistic missile potentially capable of hitting the United States on Monday, December 18, Seoul and Tokyo announced, just hours after another late-night launch of a short-range missile. .
These two consecutive launches come a few days after warnings from Seoul and Washington which warned Pyongyang that “any nuclear attack” against the United States or its allies would lead to the end of the regime of Kim Jong-un, the North Korean leader.
The South Korean military announced that it had detected the launch of a long-range ballistic missile launched Monday from the Pyongyang region, estimating that it had traveled 1,000 km before crashing into the Sea of Japan. Japan said it was probably an ICBM-class missile. This type of projectile “could have the capacity to fly more than 15,000 km, and in this case the entire territory of the United States would be within its range”according to Parliamentary Deputy Defense Minister Shingo Miyake.
Its flight lasted 1 hour 13 minutes, reaching a maximum altitude of more than 6,000 km. And around 9:37 a.m. Japanese time (1:37 a.m. Paris time) the missile fell into the sea outside Japan’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ), 250 km northwest of the small island of Okushiri which is neighboring that of Hokkaido (north of the country), said Mr. Miyake.
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« Grave menace »
Japan, South Korea and the United States condemned the shooting. “These launches, like other ballistic missile launches carried out by Pyongyang this year, constitute a violation of several United Nations Security Council resolutions”declared the spokesperson for the American State Department in a press release to Agence France-Presse.
Seoul “strongly condemns” its northern neighbor who “poses a serious threat to the peace and security of the Korean Peninsula and the international community” with this launch, underlines the South Korean presidency in a press release published after an emergency meeting of the National Security Council.
North Korea has already carried out four ICBM tests this year, the last of which, a Hwasong-18, dates back to July. This solid fuel missile, already tested last April, has the particularity of being easier to transport and faster to launch than liquid fuel versions.
The United States and South Korea participated in the second session of the Nuclear Advisory Group in Washington on Friday, focusing on nuclear deterrence in the event of conflict with the North. It was on this occasion that the White House warned that any nuclear attack by Pyongyang would bring an end to the regime.
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“Preventive and deadly response”
On Sunday, a spokesperson for the North Korean defense ministry denounced a plan by the allies to add a nuclear exercise next year to their annual joint military exercises.
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“This is an open statement on nuclear confrontation aimed at making the use of nuclear weapons against [Corée du Nord] a done deal “the ministry said in a statement published by the official North Korean news agency KCNA. “Any attempt to use armed forces against the DPRK will be met with a preventive and deadly response”the press release added, referring to the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, the official name of North Korea.
Sunday’s short-range missile launch came as Pyongyang marked the death anniversary of leader Kim Jong-un’s father and predecessor, Kim Jong-il, who died on Dec. 17, 2011.
North Korea declared itself a nuclear power last year “irreversible” and has repeatedly declared that it will never abandon its nuclear program, which the regime considers essential to its survival. Last month, North Korea succeeded in placing its first spy satellite “Malligyong-1” into orbit, after two failures in May and August.
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The West, Japan and South Korea denounced this launch, as did the Secretary General of the United Nations (UN), Antonio Guterres, judging that the use of ballistic missile technologies violated UN Security Council resolutions. UN.
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