North Korea announced today, Thursday, that it launched a short-range ballistic missile towards the Yellow Sea, which lies between China and the Korean Peninsula, days before joint military exercises between Seoul and Washington.
The launch came after a statement issued last Tuesday by Kim Yo-jong, the sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, warning that any move to shoot down a North Korean test missile would be considered a declaration of war.
This experience also comes at a time when the US and South Korean forces are preparing to start the most important joint military exercises, under the name "Freedom Shield", in 5 years, next week, and will last for 10 days.
The South Korean news agency (Yonhap) said that North Korea blamed a joint military exercise between the United States and South Korea for the escalation of tensions.
On the other hand, Washington and Seoul assert that they are defensive exercises, but Pyongyang considers them to be exercises for invading its territory or overthrowing its regime.
In response to the missile test, the US Indo-Pacific Command said that the test "does not pose a threat to the United States or its allies, but Pyongyang's weapons of mass destruction and ballistic missile programs have a destabilizing effect in the region."
And at the end of last February, North Korea announced that it had launched cruise missiles, after South Korea and the United States conducted exercises in Washington simulating responses to a North Korean nuclear attack.
"Since September 2022, North Korea has timed missile launches and military displays to counter US-South Korean exercises, possibly in an effort to force the United States and South Korea to change their behaviour," US intelligence agencies said in a report evaluating the threat.