North Korea fired four ballistic missiles into the sea near South Korea’s coast Saturday, the latest salvo in Pyongyang’s show of military might that has led to rising tensions in the region, with the US responding by sending two supersonic bombers over the South.
South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said the four short-range missiles were fired from a North Korean western coastal area, and flew about 80 miles toward the country’s western sea.
The North has test-fired more than 30 missiles this week, including an intercontinental ballistic missile Thursday which triggered an evacuation alert in northern Japan — a response to an aerial military exercise between South Korea and the US.
Saturday, two B-1B bombers trained with four U.S. F-16 fighter jets and four South Korean F-35 jets on the final day of the joint air fore drills, The South Korean military said. It was the first time since 2017 that bombers were deployed to the Korean Peninsula.
North Korea’s Foreign Ministry defended their military response to the joint US-South Korea drills, calling them “military confrontation hysteria” in a statement Friday.
North Korea said it would respond with the “toughest counteraction” to any attempts by “hostile forces” to infringe on its sovereignty or security interests.
With Post Wires
