SEOUL, April 2 — North Korea fired a medium-range ballistic missile today, Seoul’s military said, the latest in a spate of banned weapons tests by Kim Jong-un’s regime this year.

Today’s launch was the third ballistic missile test of 2024, after a solid-fuel one overseen by Kim in March and another tipped with a manoeuvrable hypersonic warhead in January.

It also comes less than two weeks after Kim supervised an engine test for a "new-type intermediate-range hypersonic missile”, according to North Korean state media, which has also said he oversaw "super large” rocket launcher drills and tank exercises this year.

Seoul’s military "detected around 06:53 (2153 GMT) what is presumed to be a medium-range ballistic missile fired from Pyongyang area into the East Sea,” the Joint Chiefs of Staff said, referring to the body of water also known as the Sea of Japan.

"We have stepped up monitoring and are closely sharing relevant information with the US and Japan,” they added.

Tokyo confirmed the missile launch, with the coastguard urging vessels to be vigilant and report any fallen objects without approaching them.

Japanese public broadcaster NHK, citing unnamed government sources, reported that the missile "appears to have fallen in waters outside Japan’s exclusive economic zone”.

Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida told reporters that the North had "repeatedly launched ballistic missiles” this year, adding that it was a threat to regional security and "absolutely unacceptable.”

The launch comes just days after a Russian veto at the United Nations ended UN expert monitoring of North Korean sanctions violations, amid a probe into alleged arms transfers between Moscow and Pyongyang.

North Korea has yet to comment on the development.

It also comes just over a week before South Korea votes in a general election, in which the party of hawkish President Yoon Suk-yeol, who has taken a tough line with Pyongyang, is seeking to win back control of the parliament.

Sanctions monitoring?

Pyongyang has been under a raft of sanctions since its second nuclear test in 2009, but the development of its nuclear and weapons programmes has continued unabated.

So far this year, the nuclear-armed North has declared South Korea its "principal enemy”, jettisoned agencies dedicated to reunification and outreach, and threatened war over "even 0.001 mm” of territorial infringement.

Last month, the United States and South Korea staged one of their major annual joint military exercises, prompting angry retorts and live-fire drills from nuclear-armed Pyongyang, which condemns all such exercises as rehearsals for invasion.

Seoul is one of Washington’s key regional allies, and the United States has stationed about 27,000 American soldiers in the South to help protect it against North Korea.

Pyongyang has recently boosted ties with traditional ally Russia.

In September last year, Russian President Vladimir Putin and Kim held a summit in Russia’s far east, during which Kim declared that ties with Moscow were his country’s "number one priority”.

The United States subsequently claimed Pyongyang had begun providing Moscow with weapons.

And South Korea asserted earlier this month that North Korea had shipped around 7,000 containers of arms to Russia for its war with Ukraine since the transfers began around last July. — AFP