Russia has provided evidence to the United Nations indicating that North Korea’s latest missile launch on July 4th tested an intermediate range rocket, despite the US’ insistence that it was an intercontinental ballistic missile.
“A Voronezh-type radar station deployed in the Irkutsk region monitored the launch of the Hwasong-14 medium-range ballistic missile (IRBM) from North Korea, which flew a distance of 510 kilometers (317 miles) in 14 minutes, reaching an altitude of 535 kilometers (332 miles) , before landing in the Sea of Japan, ” reads a letter from Russia’s UN mission addressed to the UN’s secretary-general and the chairman of the Security Council.
An illustration of the trajectory of the missile and the territory it covered during flight is included in an addition to the letter.
The evidence, compiled by the Russian Defense Ministry, was sent to the UN after a fierce Security Council debate over North Korea’s missile launch earlier this week, in which the UN’s assistant secretary-general backed the US assessment that the Hwasong-14 missile does, indeed, possess the technical characteristics to be called an ICBM.
