The military of South Korea reported on Wednesday that it has shot three air-to-ground missiles in response to North Korean missile launches.
According to a statement from the South Korean military, the missiles were shot into the waters “near the Northern Limit Line at a distance similar to the area where the North Korean missile struck.” Seoul would react “sternly to any provocations,” the military added
The military of South Korea reported that three precision-guided missiles were fired by its fighter jets close to the eastern border of its rivals.
According to the statement, the launches were in response to a barrage of earlier North Korean missile tests.
One of the North Korean missiles fell close to the maritime border, according to South Korea.
North Korean missiles have never before come this near to South Korean waters since the peninsula was divided more than seven decades ago.
According to Yonhap News Agency, South Korea condemned North Korea’s missile launches and branded them “intolerable” acts.
Following the launch of short-range missiles by North Korea on Wednesday, Seoul declared an air raid alert.
An official on the island was quoted by the South Korean news outlet Yonhap as saying that after the air raid warning for Ulleung was announced on national television, workers took refuge in a basement.
Invoking national mourning for the 156 people who died in the Itaewon crowd crush at the weekend, President Yoon Suk-yeol called a meeting of the National Security Council and denounced the “unprecedented” launches.
He was cited as saying in a statement released after the NSC meeting that firing a missile south of the NLL amounted to “territorial infringement.”
According to Kang Shin-Chul, Director of Operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, “the North Korean missile launch is very unusual and unacceptable as it fell close to South Korean territorial waters” south of the maritime border.
According to the South’s military, the North launched at least three short-range ballistic missiles (SRBMs) into the East Sea earlier in the day, with one of them crossing its de facto maritime border with South Korea, Yonhap News Agency said.
The launches came only a few hours after Pyongyang urged an end to extensive military drills between South Korea and the United States, claiming that such “military rashness and aggression can no longer be permitted.”
The missile firing from a location in or near the eastern coastal city of Wonsan in the North was discovered at about 8:51 am, according to the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS).
The JCS stated in a news release that the North Korean missile launch, which was the first since the peninsula’s division to land close to our territorial waters south of the Northern Limit Line, was extremely unusual and intolerable.
The statement continued, “Our military vowed to respond firmly to this (provocation).”
As a result of repeated missile launches by Kim-led North Korea, including one this month that flew over neighboring Japan, tensions on the Korean peninsula are rising. In response, bombing practice was conducted by the US and its allies.
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