North Korea's Kim Yo Jong says intermediate-range missile test was conducted

SEOUL: North Korea's Kim Yo Jong, the powerful sister of leader Kim Jong Un, said in a statement on Saturday (Oct 3) that her country had tested an intermediate-range strategic missile.

The South Korean military said earlier on Saturday that North Korea fired a ballistic missile which flew more than 700km toward the sea off its east coast.

Kim Yo Jong, who is a director of North Korea's ruling party, said a drill of a "strategic weapon" was conducted toward the sea off its east coast using the intermediate-range missile.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un oversaw the drill which was carried out by "a firepower sub-unit undertaking an exclusive special mission", his sister said.

Citing statements by Seoul and Tokyo regarding how far the missile flew, she said that their results showed the limitations of their tracking capability.

"Whenever we applied the wave-like trajectory mode to missiles, the enemy failed to track the targets from their first skip points," she said, without showing any evidence.

South Korea and Japan also "should acknowledge the speed of the missile", she said without disclosing the speed. The missile was also capable of changing its flight orbit at a low altitude with artificial intelligence technology applied, she added.

"In other words, this means that there is no way to avoid this attack," she said.

North Korea has launched missile tests on more than 10 occasions so far this year. Pyongyang has sometimes said it was testing new types of weapons systems. Some of the tests have come after North Korea protested joint military drills between Seoul and Washington.

The launch came after Kim Yo Jong issued a statement on Friday that dismissed Seoul's demand for an apology for what it said were North Korean mines that seriously wounded South Korean soldiers in the Demilitarized Zone, a heavily fortified area between the two Koreas.