North Korea fires around 10 ballistic missiles toward sea off east coast, Seoul says

SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea fired around 10 short-range ballistic missiles toward the sea off its east coast on Thursday, South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said. The missiles were launched around 12:30 p.m. local time (11:30 p.m. Wednesday ET) from an area around Wonsan on North Korea’s eastern coast, the JCS said in a statement. South Korea’s military was strengthening surveillance and maintaining readiness in case of additional launches, while closely sharing information with the United States and Japan, it added. Japan’s Defense Ministry said North Korea had launched an object that could be a ballistic missile and that it fell outside Japan’s Exclusive Economic Zone, according to the Yonhap news agency. Japan’s coast guard also said earlier that the launched projectile could be a ballistic missile and had already fallen into the sea. North Korea last fired ballistic missiles on Oct. 12, amid heightened tension on the inter-Korean border over a mine blast that wounded South Korean soldiers last month. Pyongyang has conducted missile tests on more than 10 occasions this year.