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North Korea’s state-run media outlet the Korean Central News Agency reported on Monday that the country had successfully tested the Hwasong-12 intermediate-range ballistic missile. (KCNA/Yonhap News)

The US has asked the UN Security Council to hold an emergency meeting in regard to North Korea’s recent launch of an intermediate-range ballistic missile.

The Associated Press and other foreign media reported Tuesday that the US State Department requested the Security Council meet behind closed doors on Thursday. The request came in response to North Korea’s launch of an IRBM toward the East Sea on Sunday.

Pyongyang’s state-run Korean Central News Agency reported on Monday that “the evaluation test-fire of [the] Hwasong 12-type ground-to-ground intermediate- and long-range ballistic missile was conducted Sunday.”

“Evaluation test-fire” refers to a test launch of a missile randomly selected from a line that’s in production and deployment in order to perform a quality check.

According to an announcement by South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff, the North Korean missile launched on Sunday flew around 800 kilometers. But considering that the missile was deliberately launched at an abnormally high angle to disguise its range, the missile is presumed to be of intermediate range, or more than 1,000 kilometers. It might even be capable of striking the island of Guam, which is over 3,400 kilometers from Pyongyang.

The UN Security Council has imposed several rounds of economic sanctions on North Korea since 2006, when the North carried out its first nuclear test. The council convened about the North’s missile program on Jan. 10, five days after the North launched what it claimed to be a hypersonic missile on Jan. 5. The council didn’t take any concrete measures against the North during that meeting.

“Deputy Secretary Sherman denounced [North Korea’s] recent and escalatory ballistic missile launches as violations of UN Security Council resolutions and destabilizing to the region,” the US State Department said via a spokesperson following Sherman’s telephone call with the vice foreign ministers of South Korea and Japan on Tuesday.

South Korea’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said the three diplomats “shared their assessment about the situation on the Korean Peninsula, including North Korea’s repeated missile launches in recent days” and “called upon North Korea to halt actions that raise tensions and to return to the path of dialogue and diplomacy.”

While reporting that US Secretary of State Antony Blinken had spoken on the phone with Japanese Foreign Minister Yoshimasa Hayashi on Tuesday, the US State Department said, “Secretary Blinken condemned [North Korea’s] recent ballistic missile launches, which were in violation of multiple UN Security Council resolutions.”

By Cho Ki-weon, staff reporter

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