North Korea fired multiple short-range ballistic missiles into the sea on Sunday, accelerating its missile launches amid talk of possible meetings with the U.S. and South Korea.
Pyongyang’s intense missile activity – this was the fourth such launch this month and the seventh of the year – is meant to display its self-defence capabilities while gaining international leverage, some experts said.
“The missile launches may be a way of showing that – unlike Iran – we have self-defence capabilities,” said South Korean former presidential security adviser Kim Ki-jung.
“The North also appears to be exerting pressure preemptively and make a show of force before engaging in dialogue with the United States and South Korea,” he said.
Sunday’s missiles were fired from near the city of Sinpo on North Korea’s east coast toward the sea around 6:10 a.m. (2110 GMT on Saturday) and flew about 140 km (90 miles), South Korea’s military said in a statement.
South Korea’s presidential Blue House convened an emergency security meeting, calling the launches a provocation that violated U.N. Security Council resolutions, according to media reports. It urged Pyongyang to “stop the provocative acts”.
In late March, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un said Pyongyang’s status as a nuclear-armed state was irreversible and expanding a “self-defensive nuclear deterrent” was essential to national security.
