N Korea fires multiple ballistic missiles: Seoul

North Korea yesterday fired multiple ballistic missiles, Seoul said, a day after South Korea concluded five days of joint maritime drills with the US and Japan that were focused on the North.

Pyongyang last month slammed plans for the so-called Freedom Edge joint exercises in international waters off South Korea as a “threat” to North Korea and other countries of the region.

Yesterday, Seoul’s military detected “multiple short-range ballistic missiles launched from the Wonsan area toward the East Sea [the Sea of Japan],” the South Korean Joint Chiefs of Staff said in a statement.

People sit near a television screen showing a news broadcast with file footage of a North Korean missile test, at a train station in Seoul yesterday.

Photo: AFP

The missiles were detected at about 05:20am and flew about 250km, they added.

South Korean and US intelligence authorities “have tracked and shared relevant developments since the initial stage of the launch and also shared information regarding the ... missile with Japan,” they said.

In its last test, North Korea fired a barrage of missiles into the sea on Aug. 20, despite an overture from US President Donald Trump, who said he planned to meet this year with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.

That launch from the nuclear-armed North came as South Korea and the US held a shorter edition of their annual Ulchi Freedom Shield military exercises, following an order from Trump to scale them back.

Trump’s order alarmed US allies in the region, with the president calling the drills “inappropriate and hostile” toward North Korea.

However, Seoul’s spy agency told lawmakers earlier this month that a summit between the US and North Korea appeared possible “at any time” as signs have emerged of dialogue between them.

Trump met Kim three times during his first term — once declaring they were “in love” — in high-profile summits aimed at securing a denuclearization deal, but no tangible progress was made.