It could be solid fuel, according to the South Korean military. This Thursday, North Korea fired a “new type” of ballistic missile on Thursday that would mark a major technological and strategic advance for Pyongyang’s weapons program. This shot triggered a brief alert in the Japanese island of Hokkaido, before Japan clarified that the projectile had not hit its territory. “North Korea appears to have launched a new type of ballistic missile, possibly solid-fuelled,” the South Korean Joint Chiefs of Staff said.
All intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) launched so far by North Korea have been liquid fueled. But solid-fuel missiles, which Pyongyang has long sought to develop, are more stable and quicker to prepare for launch than liquid-fuel ones, which can make it more difficult for US forces to detect and destroy them. At a military parade in Pyongyang in February, North Korea showed off a record number of missiles, including what analysts believe is a new solid-propellant ICBM.
A “shameless violation”
Launched Thursday at 7:23 a.m. (00:23 a.m. French time), the missile followed a lobed trajectory and “traveled 1,000 km before landing in the East Sea”, the Korean name for the Sea of Japan, the army said. South Korean. United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called on Pyongyang to “reopen communication channels and resume dialogue” in favor of peace and full denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, in a statement condemning the launch.
In Paris, Anne-Claire Legendre, spokesperson for the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs, called for “a firm and united response from the international community”. “This launch constitutes a shameless violation of several United Nations Security Council resolutions, unnecessarily increases tensions and risks destabilizing security in the region”, denounced in a press release Adrienne Watson, spokesperson for the National Security Council of the American presidency.
Analysis of the shooting in progress
“The United States will take all necessary measures to ensure the security of American homeland and its allies in the Republic of Korea and Japan,” she added. Beijing for its part condemned the “negative” role of Washington, considered responsible for the renewed tensions in the peninsula. “The negative impact of the previous United States military exercise and the deployment of strategic weapons around the peninsula [coréenne] is obvious to all,” Wang Wenbin, a spokesperson for Chinese diplomacy, told reporters, calling on all parties to “remain calm and exercise restraint.”
The shooting is being analyzed, according to the South Korean staff. It came as two meetings of the G7 countries are scheduled for the next few days in Japan: a meeting of environment ministers in Hokkaido on Saturday and Sunday, and one of foreign ministers on Sunday and Monday in Karuizawa (center), before the G7 summit scheduled for May in Hiroshima.
Stepping up exercises for “real war”
On Monday, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un called for increasing his country’s deterrence capabilities to counter “the escalation of maneuvers by US imperialists and treacherous South Korean puppets to unleash a war of aggression according to the official KCNA news agency. Since March 23, Pyongyang has notably claimed to have carried out three tests of an “underwater nuclear attack drone” capable of “producing a large-scale radioactive tsunami”. These craft are known as “Haeil”, which means tsunami in Korean.
The regime also said it launched an ICBM on March 16. Last year, North Korea declared itself an “irreversible” nuclear power, thus burying any possibility of negotiation on its denuclearization. Also in March, Kim Jong-un ordered his troops to intensify their exercises for “real war”.