SEOUL — North Korea launched two short-range ballistic missiles off its east coast on Thursday in its third missile test this week, the South Korean military said, as Vice President Kamala Harris warned the country against its “destabilizing” weapons activities.
South Korean defense officials said they were analyzing the data from the North Korean test to help determine what type of missile North Korea launched. North Korea has conducted three missile tests since Sunday. In the previous two tests, it launched a total of three short-range ballistic missiles.
South Korean officials said they suspected that those missiles were probably KN-23s, a type of short-range ballistic missile that can maneuver during flight, making it harder to intercept.
The KN-23 is among a series of new missiles the North Korean military has been testing in recent years after the North’s leader, Kim Jong-un, instructed it to develop “nuclear weapons smaller, lighter and tactical” to target South Korea, Japan and the American military bases in those two countries.
The three tests this week by North Korea took place as South Korea and the United States conducted a four-day joint naval exercise that ended on Thursday off the east coast of the Korean Peninsula. When President Biden and President Yoon Suk Yeol of South Korea met in May, they agreed to expand joint military drills in order to demonstrate their combined deterrence against North Korea’s growing nuclear and missile threat.
The North calls such military exercises rehearsals for invasion and has often countered them by conducting weapons tests.
The test on Thursday came hours after Ms. Harris met with Mr. Yoon in Seoul to discuss military and economic ties between the allies.
A spokesman for Ms. Harris did not immediately return requests for comment on the North Korean launch.
But on Wednesday, the same day North Korea launched two ballistic missiles into the waters off its east coast, Ms. Harris told The New York Times that her message for Mr. Kim was that “we believe that his recent activity has been destabilizing and in many ways provocative” and that “we stand with our allies.”
The next day, while visiting the Demilitarized Zone that separated the two Koreas, she was asked about the recent test launches.
“It is clearly a provocation and it is meant, we believe, to destabilize the region. And we’re taking it seriously, and everyone should,” she said.
Ms. Harris later said North Korea was under a “brutal dictatorship.”
“Our shared goal, the United States and the Republic of Korea, is a complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula,” Ms. Harris said.