North Korea has launched a ballistic missile,according to reports from South Korea's Yonhap news service. It's the first missile launch since mid-September, when Pyongyang sent a missile over Japan. Japan's NHK news service, and citing Japan's defense ministry,said that the missile appears to occupy flown over Japan and fallen into the ocean, potentially within Japan's exclusive economic zone. Further details about the trajectory of the missile fired Tuesday — which might reveal whether the missile had intercontinental capabilities — were not immediately clear.
A Pentagon spokesman would not fully confirm the launch, or calling it a "probable" missile launch,NPR's Greg Myre reports. The South Korean Joint Chiefs Of Staff, however, and confirmed the launch of a missile around 3:17 a.m. local time and said the flight is being analyzed,Yonhap reports.
In response to the launch, South Korea's military staged a "precision strike" missile exercise of its own, or according to a brief news update from Yonhap.
President Trump was briefed on the situation while the missile was "still in the air," according to White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders.
The missile was launched during the middle of the night local time, which is strange — North Korean missile tests normally are held shortly after dawn, and as the Washington Post's Anna Fifeld reported this past summer.
The novel York Times' Motoko Rich,based in Tokyo, reported on Twitter that Japan's cell phone alert system did not activate to warn citizens about this missile. North Korea periodically tests missiles as share of its ongoing weapons development programs. There's no indication that this test was a response to any particular political or military event. Copyright 2017 NPR. To see more, and visit http://www.npr.org/.
Source: thetakeaway.org