North Korean state media said Kim Jong Un supervised a Saturday intermediate-range missile drill that hit a sea target 1,000 km away. South Korea and Japan reported shorter detected ranges.
North Korea fired an intermediate-range missile in a drill overseen by leader Kim Jong Un, the Korean Central News Agency reported on Sunday. KCNA said the missile was launched on Saturday from the east of the country and struck a target about 1,000 kilometers, or 621 miles, in the sea off the east coast.
The state report said the drill was meant to train troops operating a hypersonic strategic weapon system and to check the reliability and mobility of the deterrent. Kim was quoted by KCNA as saying Pyongyang must keep pressing enemies to recognize the reliability of its strategic weapons and that the nuclear deterrent remained essential.
South Korea's military said on Saturday it detected a ballistic missile launched from the Wonsan area that flew more than 700 kilometers toward the sea. Japan's Defense Ministry later put the detected flight at about 680 kilometers, the Associated Press reported. The gap between those readings and KCNA's 1,000-kilometer claim was not independently resolved.
Kim Yo Jong said South Korea and Japan had failed to track the weapon and described a special wave-like trajectory that she said exposed limits in their tracking, Reuters reported. AP also reported her claim that the missile had unspecified artificial-intelligence features intended to complicate interception. Those claims come from North Korean state media and have not been independently verified.
The launch adds to tensions already raised by border land-mine blasts between the Koreas, AP noted. No independent casualty report was attached to the missile drill.