The Japanese Defense Ministry reported that an unidentified missile launched from North Korea would have fallen about 170 kilometers off the coast of Aomori prefecture, northwest of the archipelago.
A distance that lies within the Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ). Sources in the ministry report on NHK public television that the bullet reached an altitude of 6,000 km, and therefore could be an ICBM.
The missile follows Pyongyang’s artillery exercises and last week’s (failed according to Seoul) launch of an apparent long-range missile system by four days. However, these are further signs of the will of the hermit state to initiate a permanent cycle of provocative acts after it threatened in January, in the face of the prolonged negotiation stalemate with the US on the nuclear dossier, to revoke its self-imposed moratorium a few years ago on the nuclear and ICBM tests.
With this experiment, in fact, there are already 12 tests of this type carried out so far this year by Piongyang, which, according to Washington and Seoul, is testing the technology of a new ICBM called Hwasong-17, which potentially has greater reach and destructive power.
The new provocation of the North Korean regime comes close to an important date, that of April 15, which celebrates the 110th anniversary of the birth of the founder of the state, Kim Il Sung, grandfather of the current leader Kim Jong Un. Currently, the Japanese premier Fumio Kishida is in Brussels for the meeting of the G7 leaders, and subsequently with the countries that make up NATO, to face the crisis of the ongoing conflict in Ukraine triggered by Russia On the sidelines of the meetings, Kishida will meet the Secretary General of the alliance, Jens Stoltenberg. In response to the latest missile launch, the Tokyo government has called for a national security conference to be opened.