North Korea launches ballistic missile ahead of Donald Trump’s summit with China’s Xi Jinping
NORTH Korea has launched a ballistic missile ahead of Donald Trump’s widely-anticipated summit with China’s Xi Jinping.
A NORTH Korean missile test has ended in failure when the rocket spun out of control and plunged into the ocean in a fiery crash, a senior US defence official said.
The launch came before US President Donald Trump’s first meeting with Chinese leader Xi Jinping, raising speculation that it might have been timed to get their attention.
The extended-range Scud missile suffered an in-flight failure and fell into the sea off North Korea’s east coast, according to US imagery and assessments, the official said on condition of anonymity.
Initial US and South Korean assessments had indicated it was an advanced KN-15 medium-range missile, whose first known test by North Korea was in February.
But unlike the KN-15, which uses solid fuel, the missile fired on Wednesday used liquid fuel and was fired from a fixed location, rather than a mobile launcher, the official said.
The South Korean military said the missile was fired from land near the east coast city of Sinpo and flew only about 60 kilometres.
North Korea is pushing hard to upgrade its weapons systems to cope with what it calls US hostility. Many weapons experts say the North could have a functioning nuclear-tipped missile capable of reaching the continental US within a few years. North Korea carried out two nuclear tests last year.
Ralph Cossa, president of the Pacific Forum CSIS think tank in Honolulu, said he was expecting North Korea would do something to coincide with the Trump-Xi summit, perhaps conduct a nuclear test. The missile launch may be a precursor, with more to come as the summit starts on Thursday, he said.
South Korea’s Foreign Ministry called the North’s latest missile launch a “reckless provocation” that posed a threat to international peace, while Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said his country lodged a strong protest over the launch.
US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson acknowledged the launch in a brief statement but said the US had spoken enough about North Korea and would not comment further.
Mr Trump has said China must do more to pressure North Korea to halt its nuclear and missile programs.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said on Wednesday that all sides needed to be involved.
“If we are serious about solving this issue, we need to tackle the root of it,” she said at a regular news briefing. “We need to balance the interest of each side. China wants to make efforts with all sides involved, to make denuclearisation a reality, and ensure peace in the region.”
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