North Korea fires ballistic missile off east coast, Japan says

SEOUL/TOKYO, Sept 20 (Reuters) – North Korea launched what appeared to be a ballistic missile into the sea to the east of the Korean Peninsula on Sunday, Japan’s defence ministry said.

South Korea’s defence ministry said the rival North had fired an unidentified projectile. Japanese public broadcaster NHK said it had come down outside Japan’s exclusive economic zone.

A day earlier, North Korea dismissed a resolution by the UN nuclear watchdog against Pyongyang’s nuclear programme, in a statement through state media.

Pyongyang last week also condemned a US-led naval drill including South Korea and Japan, which ran from August 29 to September 10 near Guam.

North Korea’s Kim Yo Jong, the influential sister of leader Kim Jong Un, on Friday blamed US-led military drills for “ever-worsening” tensions on the Korean Peninsula and vowed no change in the country’s course to strengthen its nuclear arsenal.

(Reporting by Cynthia Kim and Heejin Kim in Seoul and Junko Fujita in Tokyo; Editing by William Mallard)

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