North Korea fired multiple ballistic missiles off its east coast on Sunday, Seoul's military said, its first launch of the year just hours before South Korea's leader heads to China for a summit.
Sunday's launch follows a US military operation against Pyongyang's socialist ally Venezuela that snatched President Nicolas Maduro out of his country -- for decades a nightmare scenario for North Korea's leadership, which has long accused Washington of seeking to remove it from power.
Seoul's defense ministry said it had detected "several projectiles, presumed to be ballistic missiles" fired from near the North Korean capital Pyongyang around 7:50 am (2250 GMT Saturday).
The missiles "flew approximately 900 kilometers (559.2 miles)", the military said, adding that South Korea and the United States were "closely analyzing the specifications" while "maintaining a full readiness posture".
The National Security Council in Seoul convened an emergency meeting after the launch, which a presidential office statement said "constitutes a provocative act in violation of United Nations Security Council resolutions".
Japan's defense ministry also said it had detected a possible ballistic missile, noting that two missiles reached an altitude of 50 kilometers and flew distances of 900 and 950 kilometers respectively.
"North Korea's nuclear and missile development threatens the peace and stability of our country and the international society, and is absolutely intolerable," Japan's defense minister Shinjiro Koizumi told reporters.
It is Pyongyang's first ballistic missile launch since November, when it staged a test after US President Donald Trump approved South Korea's plan to build a nuclear-powered submarine.
One analyst said Trump's military operation against Venezuela on Saturday likely played a role in the decision to carry out the launch.
Pyongyang has for decades argued it needs its nuclear and missile programs as a deterrent against alleged regime change efforts by Washington. The United States has offered Pyongyang repeated assurances that it has no such plans.
"They likely fear that if the United States so chooses, it could launch a precision strike at any moment, threatening the regime's survival," said Hong Min, an analyst at the Korea Institute for National Unification.
"The underlying message is likely that attacking North Korea would not be as easy as a strike on Venezuela," he said.
A former senior North Korean diplomat said Pyongyang should learn from the US operation to detain Maduro.
"I hope it remembers former president Maduro for a long time -- as a man who squandered a valuable opportunity through bluster," Lee Il-kyu, Pyongyang's former political counsellor in Cuba who defected to South Korea in 2023, said in a Facebook post on Sunday.
- Lee bound for China -
The test also came just hours before South Korean President Lee Jae Myung departs for Beijing for talks with his counterpart Xi Jinping, whose government is a key economic backer of North Korea.
Lee hopes to possibly harness China's clout over North Korea to support his bid to improve ties with Pyongyang.
North Korea has stepped up missile testing significantly in recent years.
Analysts say this drive is aimed at improving precision strike capabilities, challenging the United States as well as South Korea and testing weapons before potentially exporting them to Russia.
Pyongyang is also set to hold a landmark congress of its ruling party in the coming weeks, its first in five years.
Economic policy, as well as defense and military planning, are likely to be high on the agenda.
Ahead of that conclave, leader Kim Jong Un ordered the "expansion" and modernization of the country's missile production and the construction of more factories to meet growing demand.
State media reported on Sunday that Kim had visited a facility involved in making tactical guided weapons.
He ordered them to expand current production capacity by 250 percent, the state-run Korean Central News Agency said.
