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Rodong Sinmun reported on Monday that North Korea’s Academy of National Defense Science had successfully conducted a test of newly developed long-range cruise missiles on Saturday and Sunday. (KCNA/Yonhap News)

North Korea announced its successful test launch of a new type of long-range cruise missile. The missile test launch was its first since March of this year.

In a front-page report Monday, the Rodong Sinmun newspaper reported that North Korea’s Academy of National Defense Science (ANDS) had “successfully test-fired new type long-range cruise missiles” on Saturday and Sunday.

It also said the missiles “traveled for 7,580 seconds along an oval and pattern-8 flight orbits in the air above [North Korea’s] territorial land and waters” and “hit targets 1,500 km away.”

“The test launches showed that the technical indices such as the thrust power of the newly developed turbine-blast engine, the missiles’ navigation control and the end guided hit accuracy by the combined guided mode met the requirements of designs,” the paper said.

“In all, the efficiency and practicality of the weapon system operation was confirmed to be excellent,” it added.

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un did not observe the test launch, which took place in the presence of Workers’ Party of Korea (WPK) Central Committee Secretary Pak Jong-chon, WPK Munitions Industry Department Vice Director Kim Jong-sik and WPK ANDS Committee Chairman Jon Il-ho.

The newspaper referred to the long-range cruise missile as “a strategic weapon of great significance in meeting the key target of the five-year plan for the development of the defense science and the weapon system set forth at the 8th Congress of the Party.”

It added that the development process had been “pushed forward according to the scientific and reliable weapon system development process for the past two years and, in this course, detailed tests of missile parts, scores of engine ground thrust tests, various flight tests, control and guidance tests, warhead power tests, etc. were conducted with success.”

“The development of this weapon system that has been powerfully pushed forward as a crucial work under the special concern of the Party Central Committee holds strategic significance of possessing another effective deterrence means for more reliably guaranteeing the security of our state and strongly containing the military maneuvers of the hostile forces against the DPRK,” it said.

North Korea previously hinted that it was developing a new model of intermediate- to long-range cruise missile in a report at the 8th WPK Congress on Jan. 9.

At the time, the report said North Korea had developed “ultra-modern tactical nuclear weapons including new-type tactical rockets and intermediate-range cruise missiles whose conventional warheads are the most powerful in the world,” which “enabled us to gain a reliable edge in military technology.”

North Korea test-launched cruise missiles on Jan. 22 — shortly after US President Joe Biden took office — and March 21, and test-launched a ballistic missile on March 25.

The UN Security Council specifies North Korea’s ballistic missile program as subject to sanctions but does not place restrictions on cruise missiles.

By Kim Ji-eun, staff reporter

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