North Korea launched the most powerful ballistic missile in its arsenal just before a summit between Japan and South Korea, with leader Kim Jong Un saying he wanted to "strike fear into the enemies,” its state media said.
Kim was on hand with his preteen daughter to watch the Thursday launch of the Hwasong-17 intercontinental ballistic missile. The test was prompted by "the frantic, provocative and aggressive large-scale war drills conducted by the U.S. and the south Korean puppet traitors,” it’s official Korean Central News Agency reported Friday. It almost never calls its neighbor by its proper name.
The launch of what weapons experts consider to be the world’s largest road-worthy ICBM came hours before South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol went to Japan for a rare summit with Prime Minister Fumio Kishida to discuss ways to mend differences and cooperate with their mutual U.S. ally to counter the nuclear threats made by Kim’s regime.