North Korea Launches Missile Over Japanese Airspace

North Korea carried out its most dangerous provocation yet on Monday, just minutes before midnight: it launched an intercontinental ballistic missile that flew over the northern part of the Japanese island of Hokkaido at a maximum altitude of 550 kilometres and, after 2,700 kilometres, fell into the Pacific Ocean, reports the Patria agency.

The projectile was launched from a range near the city of Sunan in Pyongyang province, the South Korean military's Joint Chiefs of Staff announced, as reported by Telegram.

The fact that the missile flew over Japanese territory shows that North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, his generals, engineers and missile experts are completely confident that they can hit targets thousands of kilometres away with intercontinental missiles with 100 percent certainty.

If that were not the case, they certainly would not have dared to launch a missile that, had it malfunctioned and fallen on a Japanese city, would have brought the world to the brink of nuclear war.

Just a few hours after the "serious threat to South Korea's security," Seoul announced that four F-15K fighter jets dropped eight MK84 bombs on a simulated target in South Korea's Gangwon province.

Robert Kelly, associate professor in the Department of Political Science at Pusan National University, said South Korea's response was carefully calibrated.

- North Korea cannot launch missiles without a response, and this one, although it looks like an escalation of the conflict, is still not too big because no one wants war.

Yoon Young-chan, a spokesman for the South Korean president, said Moon Jae-in wanted to "show the ability to punish the North."

A Defense Ministry official said in Seoul that all bombs hit the target.

- The exercise confirmed the ability of South Korea and its allies to destroy enemy political leadership - the South Korean official said.

At the request of Japan, South Korea and the United States, an emergency session of the UN Security Council will be held today.