North Korea claims that the test in the Yellow Sea was aimed at impressing its “enemies” with its capabilities.
Published October 29, 2025
North Korea test-fired several sea-to-surface cruise missiles into western waters hours before President Donald Trump began his visit to South Korea, state media said.
The state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said on Wednesday that the missile was launched in the Yellow Sea on Tuesday and flew for more than two hours before hitting its target accurately.
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Park Jeong-chun, the senior military official who oversaw the test, said “significant successes” were being achieved in developing North Korea’s “nuclear forces” as a deterrent to war, according to KCNA.
The test aimed to “evaluate the reliability of various strategic attack methods and impress the enemy with their capabilities,” Park said.
He added, “It is our responsible mission and obligation to constantly strengthen our nuclear combat readiness.”
South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said on Wednesday that the military had detected North Korea preparing to launch, and a cruise missile was launched in the country’s northwestern waters around 3pm (6pm Japan time) on Tuesday.
Joint commanders said South Korea and the United States are maintaining a joint defense posture capable of analyzing weapons and providing a “superior response” to any provocation by North Korea.
North Korea’s latest launch follows last week’s short-range ballistic missile test, which the country announced included a new hypersonic system designed to strengthen its nuclear war deterrence.
The test came hours before a scheduled summit between President Trump and South Korean President Lee Jae-myung in Gyeongju, where South Korea is hosting this year’s Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) meeting.
President Trump has expressed interest in meeting with Chairman Kim Jong Un while in South Korea, and a summit meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping is also scheduled.
However, South Korean officials say a meeting between Trump and Kim is unlikely to happen.
Kim said he personally still had “fond memories” of Trump, but said he would only accept talks if the US stopped insisting that it abandon its nuclear weapons program.
Since the high-stakes nuclear diplomacy between Kim and Trump collapsed in 2019 during the first term of the US president, North Korea has avoided any form of talks with the US government or South Korea.
President Trump visited Tokyo before flying to South Korea and met with families of Japanese people abducted by North Korea on Tuesday, telling them that “America will always be with them” as they seek help finding their loved ones.
After years of denial, North Korea admitted in 2002 that it had sent operatives to abduct 13 Japanese nationals decades earlier for the purpose of training spies in Japanese language and customs.
Japan announced that 17 nationals had been abducted, and five of them had been repatriated. North Korea announced that as of 2019, eight people had died, and the remaining four had not entered the country.
