North Korea fires missile over Japan

North Korea today fired a missile over Japan which experts said was an intermediate-range Hwasong-12 missile escalating tensions in the Korean peninsula even as US and South Korean forces continue to conduct military drills in the region.

Japanese air defence personnel participated in a drill just hours after North Korea launched a ballistic missile over its territory.

The drill was conducted at Yokota US airbase on the outskirts of Tokyo with Japan's air defence personnel conducting drills with radars, antennas and Patriot Advanced Capability 3 and PAC-3, Reuters reported.

Add WION as a Preferred Source

North Korea had fired three short-range ballistic missiles on Saturday, two missiles failed in flight and the third blew up "almost immediately" however this time the missile flew over Japan and landed in waters off northern Hokkaido.

The missile launch led to a huge panicwith Japan warning its citizens of a missile launch in the J-Alert system, bullet trains were stopped and Japan's stock market the Nikkei fell one per cent.

"North Korea's reckless action is an unprecedented, serious and a grave threat to our nation," Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe told reporters.

PM Abe said Japan is seeking an urgent UN meeting to pressure North Korea, the test he said was a clear violation of the UN resolution. South Korea too condemned the recent missile launch by its neighbour.

North Korea's state media had published photographs last Wednesday of Kim standing next to a diagram of a three-stage rocket it called the Hwasong-13. Missile experts were unsure whether it was fully developed, some felt itcould even be a ploy by Kim's government to tacitly warn its neighbours including the US but the latest missile test has almost made Pyongyang's intentions clear.

South Korea's military said the missile was launched from the Sunan region near the North Korean capital in the morning before 6am and flew 2,700 km, reaching an altitude of about 550 km.