North Korea has fired three short-range ballistic missiles toward the Sea of Japan, the latest launches in a year.

Japan’s Ministry of Defence said the first ballistic missile was fired on Saturday morning shortly after 08:00 am local time (23:00 GMT), the second was launched at approximately 08:14 am (23:14 GMT), and a third missile took off a minute later, according to Aljazeera.

All three missiles were fired from the suburbs of the capital Pyongyang and reached an altitude of 100km (62 miles) and flew for an estimated 350km (217 miles).

The missiles splashed down in the Sea of Japan but outside Japan’s exclusive economic zone – a body of water that extends approximately 370km (200 nautical miles) from the country’s coastline – according to the ministry and news organizations.

The ministry said that warning information was provided to aircraft and ships in the vicinity of the missiles’ flight path, but there were no incidents reported “at this time”.

South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff confirmed the missile launches by North Korea and said their military was monitoring the situation.

Source: AFP