North Korea fired some 10 artillery shells from its multiple rocket launchers in the morning, South Korea’s military said Thursday.
“Our military detected 10 artillery shells from multiple rocket launcher systems that were fired from the Sunan area in North Korea, near Pyongyang, towards the northwest at around 10 a.m.,” the South’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said.
The Yellow Sea lies northwest of Sunan.
The JCS said it had detected signs of the launches in advance and was prepared to respond.
South Korean and US intelligence authorities are conducting an analysis of the latest weapon test, the JCS said.
While the JCS usually immediately alerts the press about North Korea’s test-firing of missiles, it said the delay in Thursday’s announcement was due to a lack of urgency. “North Korea constantly fires artillery shells from multiple rocket launchers, and Thursday’s launch was not a ballistic missile.”
While the JCS and the North both have yet to announce whether the artillery shells fired Thursday were from 240 mm or 600 mm multiple rocket launchers, observers projected it to be the former.
North Korea announced last year that it would deploy an upgraded 240 mm multiple rocket launcher to its military starting that year. The weapon system is known to target the South’s broader capital area.
Thursday’s test-firing closely followed a trilateral aerial exercise jointly conducted by South Korea, the US and Japan on Wednesday, to strengthen security cooperation. It marked the first of such exercises to take place after the launch of the Lee Jae Myung administration.
mkjung@heraldcorp.com
