North Korea launches 10 ballistic missiles off east coast
Volley comes days before Pyongyang's border-loudspeaker deadline, Seoul's military called the previous launches a reply to its own hypersonic test
Images
People walk past a screen showing news coverage with file footage of a North Korean missile launch at Seoul Station in Seoul on October 29, 2026 (AFP/Getty)
AFP/Getty
Propaganda messages at a North Korean village are seen in this picture taken from an observation deck in Gimpo, South Korea, October 26, 2026. REUTERS/Kim Hong-Ji (Reuters)
Reuters
People sit next to a screen showing news coverage with file footage of a North Korean missile launch at Seoul Station in Seoul on October 29, 2026 (AFP/Getty)
AFP/Getty
North Korea fired about 10 ballistic missiles toward the sea off its east coast on Thursday, South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff said, days before a deadline Pyongyang has set for switching on anti-South propaganda loudspeakers along the border. The short-range missiles were launched from around Wonsan at around 12:30 pm and flew roughly 250 kilometres before falling into the sea.
Japan's defence ministry said the projectiles did not appear to have landed in its exclusive economic zone. South Korea's presidential National Security Office convened an emergency meeting, called the launches a 'serious violation' of UN Security Council resolutions and urged the North to halt them.
It is the third North Korean launch this month. On October 3, state media reported a hypersonic missile test supervised by Kim Jong Un, and on October 12 the North fired again — launches that the South's own Joint Chiefs of Staff spokesman described as 'a show of force in response to the successful test launch of our hypersonic missile.' President Lee Jae Myung had overseen South Korea's first test-firing of a hypersonic missile earlier that month.
The missile exchanges sit on top of a border dispute that neither side concedes. Two mine explosions in the Demilitarised Zone on September 21 wounded three South Korean soldiers; Seoul says North Korean forces planted the mines, calls it an armistice violation and demands an apology. Pyongyang denies responsibility and says Seoul fabricated the incident.
Last week Kim Yo Jong, the sister of Kim Jong Un, said loudspeakers capable of blasting anti-South propaganda would be placed on standby across the border within days, with broadcasts operating along the entire border by the end of October. Kim Yong Hyun, a professor of North Korean studies at Seoul's Dongguk University, read Thursday's launch as part of a broader series of shows of force, intended to demonstrate increasingly advanced missile capabilities to the United States, Japan and the wider international community.
South Korea says it is strengthening surveillance, sharing information with Washington and Tokyo and maintaining readiness for further launches. North Korea has been under UN sanctions aimed at halting its nuclear weapons and ballistic missile development since 2006.