Again today North Korea fires missile at South Korea: situation worsening

Seoul: What is North Korea up to? Many analysts find North Korea's aggressive behaviour strange after it fired a couple of ballistic missiles again on Thursday.

South Korean military issued warnings to the residents of the nation's Islands that lie close to North Korea.

Warnings were also issued by Japan to people in parts of northern Japan to seek shelter, according to the news agency AFP.

While giving details of the missiles fired by North Korea, the military of South Korea said it was maintaining a full readiness posture closely cooperating with the US putting up surveillance and vigilance.

On Wednesday North Korea fired more than 20 missiles with one short-range ballistic missile crossing the Northern Limit—the de facto maritime border between the neighbours.

After one missile crossed the maritime borders, South Korea warned residents of its Ulleungdo island to seek shelter in bunkers.

Suddenly air raid sirens went off on South Korea's eastern island giving the feeling of a war descending on the residents.

Today too, according to local media, sounds of sires were heard on the island of Ulleungdo.

North Korea, whose capital is Pyongyang, is provoked by the warplane drills carried out jointly by the US and South Korea.

Hundreds of warplanes from both countries that criss-cross the sky make North Korea obviously insecure.

Pyongyang has called the ongoing joint exercise an aggressive and provocative military drill targeting the family-ruled communist nation.

North Korea warned South Korea and the US that if it continued with the exercise they would "pay the most horrible price in history."

Japan is also concerned about North Korea's game of chicken with missiles. Japan confirmed North Korea's missile launches issuing a warning to the residents of its northern region, asking them to stay indoors.

Initially, Japan was to declare a 'J-Alert' believing that a missile had flown over the nation.

But defence minister Yasukazu Hamada would later say that "the missile did not cross the Japanese archipelago, but disappeared over the Sea of Japan."

It was the first time North Korea had fired a missile over Japan since 2017.

Both the US and South Korea take North's missile launches as a ploy to conduct another nuclear test, which will be its seventh.