North Korea fires ballistic missile over Japan, forcing country into latest state of alert

News coverage of the North Korean missile launch.
North Korea fires ballistic
missile over Japan, forcing
country into latest state of
alert
Pyongyang's launch of ballistic missile
comes after threat to 'sink' Japan and UN
approval of new sanctions.
North Korea has fired a ballistic missile over Japan,
its latest act of aggression against a neighbour and
key Western ally amid a escalating war of rhetoric
with the United States. The missile launch will
prove a stern test for both President Doanld Trump
and the UN who have so far failed to get
Pyongyang to rein in its nuclear ambitions.
The Japanese government said the missile, which
was launched from Pyongyang's Sunan district, had
passed over Hokkaido and the country's military did
not try to shoot it down. The US military also said
it had detected an intermediate-range ballistic
missile, with Defence Secretary Jim Mattis saying
the projectile “put millions of Japanese into duck
and cover”. Japan issued a nationwide alert that
urged residents in the country's north to take
shelter, and Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary
Yoshihide Suga told reporters he condemned the
attack in the strongest possible terms.
US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson urged China
and Russia to take direct action against North
Korea in response to its latest missile launch.
"China and Russia must indicate their intolerance
for these reckless missile launches by taking direct
actions of their own," he said in a statement.
This is the second time in recent weeks that a
North Korean missile has flown over Japan, putting
the country on high alert and emphasising the
stakes as North Korea accompanies hostile
language with displays of more sophisticated
military technology.
That provocative conduct has repeatedly spurred
the United Nations to action but to little effect.
Leaders are gathering soon for a United Nations
General Assembly meeting, the first for Donald
Trump. The UN Security Council planned to
convene a meeting today to discuss the latest
firing.
While the White House confirmed that Mr Trump
had been briefed last night, Press Secretary Sarah
Huckabee Sanders referred reporters to the State
Department and the Department of Defense for a
response. Earlier in the day Mr Trump told
reporters that “people in this country will be very,
very safe.”
The latest missile reportedly travelled 3,700 km,
farther than the 2,700 km logged by the prior
missile hurled over Japan and far enough to
potentially strike the American territory of Guam.
North Korea has issued a series of threats against
Guam, which hosts a substantial American military
presence, and Korean state media called the prior
test of a missile over Japan a “a meaningful
prelude to containing Guam”. In a statement, US
Pacific Command said the latest missile “did not
pose a threat to Guam”.
Kim Jong-un inspects weapon
North Korea says is powerful
hydrogen bomb
An increasingly assertive North Korea has been
displaying its advances in military technology by
launching a steady drumbeat of missile tests and,
last weekend, performing its sixth nuclear test that
was far more powerful than previous attempts.
In the wake of that test, the UN approved the
latest round of sanctions, which seek to further
stifle North Korea’s economy by limiting energy
exports and banning textile exports. But in
response North Korea lashed out with a statement
calling to “annihilate the US imperialist aggressors"
and “reduce the U.S. mainland into ashes and
darkness”.
The statement, issued by a spokesman for the
government-run Korea Asia-Pacific Peace
Committee and carried by Korean propaganda arm
KCNA, also advocated the destruction of Japan.
“The four islands of the archipelago should be
sunken into the sea by the nuclear bomb of Juche.
Japan is no longer needed to exist near us”, the
spokesman said.
While the United States initially did not formally
concur with North Korea’s statement that the
device used for that nuclear test was a hydrogen
bomb, yesterday Air Force General John Hyten
cited the blast’s size in telling reporters that “I‘m
assuming it was a hydrogen bomb”.
As North Korean has continued to defy the world
with weapons tests and belligerent rhetoric, the
warnings from Washington have kept pace. Donald
Trump contributed to rising tensions when he
warned in August that the United States would
respond with “fire and fury” to continued menacing
from North Korean.
Since then, as North Korea has continued to flex
its muscles, while the Trump administration has
consistently kept the use of military force on the
table. Mr Mattis has said America would marshal a
“massive military response” to threats from North
Korea saying America was capable of “the total
annihilation of a country”.
Before the latest missile launch Mr Trump alluded
to working with China to tackle the North Korean
peril, saying “we have a great relationship with
China, and the president of China”, though China
has chastised the US for escalating tensions. Mr
Trump and Chinese President Xi Jingping
emphasized a nonmilitary response after recently
discussing the standoff on the phone, though Mr
Trump pointedly did not rule it out.
In an interview with Sky News, Australian Prime
Minister Malcolm Turnbull condemned the latest
launch as “dangerous” and “criminal” but portrayed
it as a sign that the latest sanctions imposed on
North Korea are having their intended effect.
“This is a sign, I believe, of their frustration at the
increased sanctions on North Korea, recently
imposed by the Security Council. It's a sign that
the sanctions are working.”

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