North launches long-range missile day after threatening ‘shocking incident’

South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff said North Korea fired a long-range ballistic missile into the East Sea on Wednesday, a day after Pyongyang threatened to shoot down U.S. reconnaissance aircraft that fly into its exclusive economic zone.

South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol speaks at a National Security Council meeting convened at 5:45 a.m. on Wednesday in Vilnius, Lithuania in response to the long-range missile launch by North Korea. Yoon is attending the annual NATO summit in Vilnius as an observer.

North Korea fired what appeared to be a long-range ballistic missile into the East Sea on Wednesday, according to South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS).

The launch came a day after Pyongyang threatened to shoot down U.S. reconnaissance aircraft that fly into its exclusive economic zone (EEZ).

The missile, which was fired at 9:59 a.m. from the vicinity of Pyongyang, flew approximately 1,000 kilometers (621 miles) along a lofted trajectory before landing in the East Sea, the JCS said.

According to the Japanese defense ministry, the missile reached a peak altitude of 6,000 kilometers and flew for 74 minutes before crashing into the sea at 11:13 a.m.

The missile’s long flight time relative to the short distance it covered appears to support the JCS assessment that it was a long-range missile fired at a high angle.

Tokyo added that the missile’s landing point was 250 kilometers west of Okushiri Island off the western coast of Hokkaido, just outside Japan’s EEZ.

Although the North has fired ballistic missiles over Japan several times in the past, it has usually opted to launch them on lofted trajectories that bring them down in the East Sea.

Wednesday’s missile is the first launched by the North after a lull of 27 days.

In a statement, the JCS condemned the launch “as a grave provocative act that harms the peace and stability of the Korean Peninsula and the international community,” calling it “a clear violation of United Nations Security Council resolutions.”

The previous day, Kim Yo-jong, the sister of North Korea’s leader Kim Jong-un, issued a statement via state media threatening a “shocking incident” if the U.S. military continued to send spy planes into its EEZ.

A Pentagon spokesperson denied that the U.S. military violated international law through its reconnaissance activities but did not address whether U.S. spy planes entered the North’s EEZ.

South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol, who is attending the annual NATO summit in Vilnius, Lithuania, as an observer, convened an emergency meeting of the National Security Council (NSC) at 5:45 a.m. local time.

During the meeting, Yoon warned the North that it would face “a bleaker future” should it “stick to reckless adventurism while neglecting the collapse of its people’s livelihoods,” according to the NSC statement.

The president also said South Korea would deepen security cooperation with the United States and Japan, including sharing real-time missile data and conducting trilateral missile defense naval exercises.

Yoon also said U.S. extended deterrence would be strengthened through the Korea-U.S. Nuclear Consultative Group (NCG), which is due to hold its first meeting in Seoul on Tuesday.

The establishment of the NCG was announced during Yoon’s state visit to Washington in May.

The NCG aims to "strengthen extended deterrence, discuss nuclear and strategic planning, and manage the threat to the nonproliferation regime” from North Korea.

The top nuclear envoys of South Korea, the United States and Japan also condemned the North’s latest launch during their phone talks on Wednesday, Seoul’s foreign ministry said.

During their talks, South Korea’s chief nuclear negotiator, Kim Gunn, and his U.S. and Japanese counterparts Sung Kim and Takehiro Funakoshi denounced the missile launch as a “grave violation” of Security Council resolutions that “cannot be justified in any way.”

BY MICHAEL LEE [lee.junhyuk@joongang.co.kr]