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North Korea fired a short-range ballistic missile into the East Sea yesterday (25th).

In the East Sea, a large-scale joint South Korea-U.S. joint exercise at sea begins today, and it appears to be an armed demonstration aimed at this.



Correspondent Kim A-young.



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Yesterday morning at 6:53 a.m., a short-range ballistic missile was fired from the Taecheon area in North Pyongan Province.



The missile, which reached a peak altitude of about 60 kilometers, was detected to have flown about 600 kilometers at a speed of Mach 5.



While our military and intelligence authorities are focusing on the possibility of the North Korean version of the Iskander series, if you look at the range alone, it will reach the vicinity of Busan, which is 620 km from Taecheon.



The U.S. carrier strike team, including the U.S. nuclear-powered aircraft carrier Ronald Reagan, is anchored in Busan, which North Korea has shown extreme resistance to.



It is to participate in the ROK-U.S. joint naval exercise in the East Sea for four days from today, but yesterday's launch seems to be a forceful demonstration aimed at this.

[Park Won-gon/Professor of North Korean Studies at Ewha Womans University: (With surface-to-surface missiles) It is not intended to attack ships, but it is aimed at this joint ROK



-US naval exercise because it showed a range that can strike Busan Port (There is room for that.)]



This is the first time the two countries have taken action after agreeing to strengthen the implementation of their commitment to extended deterrence.



It will be the first time in about five years since November 2017, when North Korea's sixth nuclear test and ICBM launch followed, that a large-scale exercise involving the U.S. military's nuclear-powered aircraft carriers and submarines was held in the East Sea.



The National Security Council announced that it will actively respond in cooperation with the United States and its allies, noting that it is the first ballistic missile launch since North Korea's enactment of a nuclear force policy that formalized the preemptive use of tactical nuclear weapons against South Korea.