North Korea fired multiple ballistic missiles toward the sea off its east coast on Sunday, South Korea and Japan reported, marking the latest in a series of launches by Pyongyang aimed at accelerating its military capabilities.
The incident marks the North's seventh ballistic missile launch this year and its fourth in April, according to the Reuters news agency.
South Korea's presidential office held an emergency security meeting following the launches, the report said.
Such tests violate United Nations Security Council resolutions against the North's missile program. However, Pyongyang rejects the UN ban and says it infringes its sovereign right to self-defense.
The missiles were fired near the city of Sinpo on North Korea's east coast at around 6:10 a.m. local time, South Korea's military said in a statement.
Japan's government posted on social media that the ballistic missiles are believed to have fallen near the east coast of the Korean Peninsula, and no incursion into Japan’s exclusive economic zone has been confirmed.
The launches come days after International Atomic Energy Agency chief Rafael Grossi said that North Korea has made "very serious" advances in its abilities to turn out nuclear weapons, with the probable addition of a new uranium enrichment facility.
In late March, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un said Pyongyang's status as a nuclear-armed state was irreversible and expanding a "self-defensive nuclear deterrent" was essential to national security.
In January, Kim personally oversaw test‑flights of hypersonic missiles, using the launch to stress the need to further strengthen the country’s nuclear war deterrent.
The launch followed a series of recent weapons activities by North Korea, which had earlier conducted a long-range strategic cruise missile launching drill observed by Kim, while also releasing images suggesting progress on the regime’s first nuclear‑powered submarine.
Kim has maintained a confrontational stance against the United States and South Korea since the conclusion of President Donald Trump’s first term in office.
Trump has expressed interest in meeting Kim, something he did three times during his first presidency from 2017 to 2021. Despite the historic meetings, their diplomacy yielded no tangible results.
Kim recently stated that he has “good memories" of Trump, but also declared that his nation will "never lay down our nuclear weapons".