Seoul: North Korea fired a ballistic missile into the sea off its eastern coast Friday, just days after leader Kim Jong-Un ordered further nuclear warhead and missile tests, South Korea's defence ministry said.
A ministry spokesman said the missile was launched from Sukchon in the country's southwest at 5:55 am (2055 GMT Thursday) and flew 800 kilometres (500 miles) into the East Sea, also called the Sea of Japan.
He did not confirm the type of missile, but South Korea's Yonhap news agency cited military sources as saying it was a Rodong missile, a scaled up Scud variant with a maximum range of around 1,300 kilometres.
Military tensions have been soaring on the divided Korean peninsula since the North carried out its fourth nuclear test on January 6, followed a month later by a long-range rocket launch that was widely seen as a disguised ballistic missile test.
The UN Security Council responded earlier this month by imposing its toughest sanctions on North Korea to date.
Pyongyang, meanwhile, has maintained a daily barrage of nuclear strike threats against both Seoul and Washington, ostensibly over ongoing, large-scale South Korea-US military drills that the North sees as provocative rehearsals for invasion.
To register its anger at the joint exercises, the North fired two short-range missiles into the East Sea on March 10.
A few days later, Kim Jong-Un announced that a nuclear warhead explosion test and firings of "several kinds" of ballistic rockets would be carried out "in a short time".
Condemnation
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said on Friday Tokyo strongly condemned North Korea's latest ballistic missile launch and demanded that Pyongyang refrain from such actions.
Abe, speaking to parliament, also said Japan had lodged a protest with North Korea over the launch, which he described as "extremely problematic".
"Japan strongly demands North Korea to exercise self-restraint and will take all necessary measures, such as warning and surveillance activity, to be able to respond to any situations," Abe said.
