North Korea conducted another missile launch into the East Sea this morning.
This is the regime's 11th launch this year... the previous one happening 22 days ago.
Our Defense Ministry correspondent Kim Ji-yeon is on the line.
Ji-yeon, what's the latest?
South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff has confirmed that North Korea fired a ballistic missile from waters near eastern coastal
county of Wonsan in North Korea's Kangwon-do Province.
The launch was fired in an easterly direction towards the East Sea at around 7:11AM Wednesday.
The maximum flight altitude was some 910 kilometers... and the flight distance was around 450 kilometers.
The Joint Chiefs sees the launch as a "Pukguksong-type" missile... a submarine-based ballistic missile... which is more threatening than missiles fired from land since the location of the launch is harder to detect in advance.
It's believed the North is developing a Pukguksong-three type missile and submarmines of more than 3-thousand ton... and that the recent launch could have been planned in advance... regardless of progress on the denuclearization talks.
The North had fired Pukguksong-one type missiles three times from submarines in 2016... and fired a Pukguksong-two type missile from land in 2017.
The Joint Chiefs said the South Korean military and the U.S. are working closely together to obtain further details about the recent launch.
It said the military is currently monitoring the situation while maintaining a defense posture in case of additional launches.
It also said North Korea's recent move does not help in alleviating tensions in the Korean peninsula and urged the North to refrain from such launches.
The timing of the launch is seen important, right?
Yes, the timing of the launch comes a day after the North announced that it will hold working-level denuclearization talks with the U.S. this week... but it also comes a day after South Korea showcased its F-35A stealth fighter jets to the public for the first time at South Korea's 71st Armed Forces Day.
Up until now, the North had heavily criticized Seoul's acquisition of the F-35A fighter jets... which can accurately hit their targets and return home while avoiding radar detection.
It is believed that the North sees the F-35A jets as one of Seoul's most threatening weapons.
Meanwhile, citing Japan's Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga... Japan-based NHK reported that the recent launches were two ballistic missiles and that one of them landed outside Japan's exclusive economic zone in the East Sea and another one near Shimane Prefecture... at around 7:17 and 7:27 this morning.
On the discrepancy between the Joint Chiefs and Tokyo... local media outlets believe that the missile may have separated in mid-air.
That's all for now.