North Korea fired a ballistic missile Sunday in an apparent bid to test the South’s new liberal president and the US which have both signaled an interest in negotiations to ease months of tensions, Agence France Presse reported.
The missile flew more than 700 kilometers (435 miles) before landing in the Sea of Japan, South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said. The US Pacific Command said it did not appear to be an intercontinental ballistic missile.
New South Korean President Moon Jae-In, who was inaugurated on Wednesday, slammed the test as a “reckless provocation” after holding an emergency meeting with national security advisors.
He said the government strongly condemned this “grave challenge to the peace and security of the Korean peninsula and the international community,” his spokesman Yoon Young-Chan said.
Moon, unlike his conservative predecessors, advocates reconciliation with Pyongyang but warned Sunday that dialogue would be possible “only if the North changes its behavior”.
Moon had said in his inauguration speech that he was willing to visit Pyongyang “in the right circumstances” to defuse tensions on the peninsula, with Pyongyang and Washington exchanging hostile rhetoric.
“The North is apparently trying to test Moon and see how his North Korea policy as well as policy coordination between the South and the US will take shape,” said Yang Moo-Jin, professor at the University of North Korea Studies in Seoul.
The launch was also aimed at “maximizing the North’s political leverage” ahead of possible negotiations with the US, as Pyongyang and Washington both recently signalled they were open to talks, he added.
“The North wants to show before negotiations that their precious, powerful weapon is not something they would give up so easily,” Yang said.
US President Donald Trump has threatened military action against the North but recently appears to have softened his stance, saying he would be “honored” to meet the North’s leader Kim Jong-Un under the right conditions.
Choe Son-Hui, a senior official at the North’s foreign ministry handling its US policy, also said Saturday the North would be willing to hold talks with the US if the conditions are right.
Source: AFP
