Leaders agreed to call for an emergency meeting of the UN security council to discuss the launch 
 
 Donald Trump and Shinzo Abe have vowed to increase pressure on North Korea after the regime launched a missile over Japan on Tuesday morning. 
 
 The Japanese prime minister denounced the launch as an “unprecedented and grave threat” to the country’s security. In a 40-minute phone call with the US president they agreed to call for an emergency meeting of the UN security council to discuss the situation. 
 
 
 
 Living on the edge of oblivion: life along the North Korean border Read more 
 
 Officials in South Korea said the missile may have flown further than any other tested by North Korea. The test, one of the most provocative ever from the reclusive state, sent a clear message to Washington just weeks after Kim Jong-un threatened to target the US Pacific territory of Guam with similar intermediate-range missiles. 
 
 It also demonstrated the regime’s willingness to raise the diplomatic stakes by sending a missile directly over Japanese territory. Pyongyang has tested more powerful intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBM) this year, but Tuesday’s launch followed a much flatter trajectory than those tests. 
 
 Trump said the US was “100% with Japan” and repeated his strong commitment to the defence of Japan, Abe said shortly after the call. 
 
 
 
 “The outrageous act of firing a missile over our country is an unprecedented, serious and grave threat and greatly damages regional peace and security,” Abe told reporters in Tokyo, adding that his government had protested to Pyongyang via the Japanese embassy in Beijing. 
 
 The missile was the third fired by North Korea to have passed over Japanese territory. The first was in 1998 and the second in 2009, although Pyongyang claims they were satellites. 
 
 Abe said Japan would “strongly call for increased pressure on North Korea in cooperation with the international community” via the security council. 
 
 
 
 The missile, thought to be a new intermediate-range Hwasong-12, flew over Hokkaido and landed in the Pacific about 733 miles (1,180km) east of the northern Japanese island, South Korean and Japanese officials said. 
 
 The Hwasong-12 is the same type of missile North Korea recently threatened to launch towards Guam. 
 
 China called for restraint and warned that the situation on the Korean peninsular had reached “a tipping point approaching a crisis”. 
 
 Foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying told a daily press briefing in Beijing: “Think hard about it, who do you think should take the blame, if China is urging all parties to calm down while one party holds constant military exercises … and the other is constantly launching missiles?” 
 
 Japan’s J-Alert warning system advised people across a large area of northern Japan to seek shelter. Japan’s self-defence forces did not attempt to shoot down the missile and there were no reports of damage from falling debris. 
 
 
 
 The public broadcaster NHK said the missile had been launched from a site near the North Korean capital, Pyongyang and passed over a sparsely populated area of Hokkaido just after 6am local time (10pm Monday British summer time). It broke into three parts and landed in the sea. 
 
 Seoul’s joint chiefs of staff (JCS) said the missile travelled about 2,700km and reached a maximum height of 550km. 
 
 The JCS said it was analysing the launch with the US and that South Korea’s military had strengthened its monitoring and preparation in case of further actions from North Korea. 
 
 Abe said his government was trying to establish the details of the launch and was doing everything possible to ensure the safety of the Japanese people. 
 
 Tuesday’s launch may have been a show of defiance towards military drills involving US and South Korean troops as well as a smaller number of personnel from other countries. 
 
 The drills have coincided with a dramatic rise in tensions on the Korean peninsula after North Korea’s test launch of two ICBMs and its threat to target seas off the coast of the Guam. 
 
 Seoul and Washington say their drills are an opportunity for the allies to improve their defensive capabilities but Pyongyang routinely denounces them as a dress rehearsal for war against North Korea. 
 
 On Tuesday North Korea’s ambassador to the UN said the joint exercises were driving the Korean peninsula towards “an extreme level of explosion”. 
 
 “Now that the US has openly declared its hostile intention towards the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, by waging aggressive joint military exercises despite repeated warnings … my country has every reason to respond with tough counter-measures as an exercise of its right to self defence,” Han Tae Song told the UN conference on disarmament, which is taking place in Geneva. 
 
 At the UN conference, multiple envoys, including those from the US, European Union, Japan and Australia took the floor to blast North Korea. “My hope is that North Korea ends this provocative behaviour,” US ambassador Robert Wood said. 
 
 Facebook Twitter Pinterest US soldiers during the annual US South Korea Ulchi-Freedom Guardian military exercises in Paju, South Korea, near the border with North Korea. Photograph: Ahn Young-joon/AP 
 
 
 
 
 
 The latest launch came three days after the North fired what were assessed as three short-range ballistic missiles into the sea and a month after its second test flight of an ICBM that analysts say could theoretically reach the US mainland. 
 
 Tuesday’s missile landed nowhere near Guam, which is about 2,500km south of Tokyo, but it covered enough distance to suggest that North Korea could follow up on its threat to the US territory. 
 
 South Korea said it was launched from Sunan, the location of Pyongyang’s international airport, raising the possibility that a runway was used as the launchpad. 
 
 Several towns in Japan have held evacuation drills this year in anticipation of a North Korean attack and there has been a steep rise in sales of individual nuclear shelters. 
 
 
 
 After North Korea threatened to fire a volley of missiles towards Guam earlier this month, Japan deployed Patriot missile defence systems in areas along the missiles’ anticipated route. Japan also has an Aegis destroyer stationed in the Sea of Japan. 
 
 North Korea first fired a missile over Japanese territory in 1998, triggering widespread condemnation and attempts by Japan’s government to improve its missile defence systems. 
 
 Japan has in the past vowed to shoot down North Korean missiles or rockets that threaten to hit its territory. In 2009 a North Korean rocket passed over Japanese territory without incident, leading to an immediate denunciation by Japan. 
 
 At the time North Korea said it was launching a telecommunications satellite but Washington, Seoul and Tokyo believed Pyongyang was testing an ICBM. 
 
 Wang Zhen in Beijing and agencies contributed to this report ||||| A day after North Korea launched a missile over Japan, Tokyo Bureau Chief Anna Fifield answers one of the questions she gets most often about North Korea: "Are we going to war?" (Anna Fifield/The Washington Post) 
 
 A day after North Korea launched a missile over Japan, Tokyo Bureau Chief Anna Fifield answers one of the questions she gets most often about North Korea: "Are we going to war?" (Anna Fifield/The Washington Post) 
 
 North Korea’s launch of a ballistic missile over Japan was unprecedented, but President Trump’s response Tuesday was not — a renewal of his warning that “all options are on the table.” His tough talk may only serve to remind that the possibility of military action has not yet deterred North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. 
 
 The missile launch seemed designed to wreak just the right amount of havoc: enough for Kim to show that he would not be cowed but not so much as to invite the “fire and fury” that Trump warned could follow continued North Korean threats. 
 
 The launch early Tuesday was the first test of such a sophisticated weapon over the landmass of a U.S. ally and an obvious warning to the United States that North Korea could easily target U.S. military facilities on Guam or elsewhere in the Pacific region. 
 
 It came during annual joint military exercises between the United States and South Korea that have infuriated the nuclear-armed communist regime. It also came despite recent offers of talks from Secretary of State Rex Tillerson. 
 
 “The world has received North Korea’s latest message loud and clear: this regime has signaled its contempt for its neighbors, for all members of the United Nations, and for minimum standards of acceptable international behavior,” Trump said in an early morning statement. 
 
 North Korea launched a ballistic missile that passed over northern Japan’s Hokkaido island on Aug. 29, before dropping into the Pacific Ocean. (Shin Takizawa/Twitter) 
 
 “Threatening and destabilizing actions only increase the North Korean regime’s isolation in the region and among all nations of the world,” he said. “All options are on the table.” 
 
 The United States requested an emergency meeting of the U.N. Security Council, which this month unanimously approved the strictest economic sanctions to date on a nation that already is one of the most heavily sanctioned in the world. 
 
 “No country should have missiles flying over them like those 130 million people in Japan. It’s unacceptable,” U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley said. 
 
 North Korea has “violated every single U.N. Security Council resolution that we’ve had, and so I think something serious has to happen,” she added. “Enough is enough.” 
 
 [ North Korean missile flies over Japan, prompting an angry response from Tokyo ] 
 
 There was no indication that Kim was intimidated by the White House reaction. The state Korean Central News Agency reported Wednesday morning local time that the North Korean leader had been present for the missile launch and had called it “a meaningful prelude to containing Guam.” According to the agency, Kim said he had gone ahead with the missile launch because the United States proceeded with “the bellicose war exercises” with South Korea. 
 
 International outrage over the latest North Korean missile went well beyond Washington. Trump spoke by phone with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe hours after the launch, and the two leaders “committed to increasing pressure on North Korea, and doing their utmost to convince the international community to do the same,” according to a White House statement. 
 
 People watch a television news screen showing file footage of a North Korean missile launch, at a railway station in Seoul on Aug. 29, 2017. (Jung Yeon-Je/AFP/Getty Images) 
 
 That was a reference to stiff international sanctions that so far have failed to stop North Korea from developing working nuclear bombs and intercontinental ballistic missiles. The United States claims North Korea could not evade those sanctions if other countries including China enforced them more stringently. 
 
 Asked about the effectiveness of sanctions and international denunciation, given that North Korea does not seem to care about the moves, deputy British U.N. envoy Jonathan Allen insisted such actions have merit. 
 
 “They send that really important message of the entire world being united, and they do have an impact on North Korea,” Allen told reporters at the United Nations. 
 
 The missile appeared to be a Hwasong-12, the intermediate-range ballistic missile that North Korea has been threatening to shoot into the waters near the U.S. territory of Guam. 
 
 But North Korea did not shoot it southeast toward Guam. Instead, it lobbed the missile in a northeasterly direction, over Japan and into the Pacific Ocean. 
 
 It was, as Stephan Haggard, a political scientist and Korea expert at the University of California at San Diego, described it, “perfectly calibrated to create political mischief.” 
 
 “The launch shows how Kim Jong Un is weirdly conservative, calibrating tests so that they are difficult to counter, flying just beneath the radar of a required kinetic response,” Haggard said. 
 
 Taro Kono, Japan’s foreign minister, acknowledged as much. “If North Korea had launched the missile to the south, the U.S. might have viewed it as a considerable provocation and responded accordingly,” Kono told reporters after the launch. 
 
 North Korea’s action also seemed designed to drive a wedge between its neighbors. 
 
 In Japan, Abe called it “an unprecedented, grave and serious threat.” Abe wants to beef up Japan’s military capabilities, and missile launches like this provide ammunition for his controversial cause. South Korea’s liberal president, Moon Jae-in, who has promoted engagement with Pyongyang, immediately denounced the launch and sent his fighter jets to drop bombs on a shooting range near the border with North Korea. 
 
 Both reactions appear to have rattled China, where officials called on all sides to take a step back. Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying characterized the North Korea situation as “at a tipping point, approaching a crisis.” She repeated China’s call for talks between North Korea and the United States. 
 
 [ North Korea launches three missiles into sea, heightening tensions ] 
 
 Tillerson had stressed Sunday that the offer of talks remained open, and he encouraged Kim to choose “a different path.” For weeks, U.S. officials have sought to assure Kim that Washington does not want to topple him or invade his country, a message also meant to appeal to North Korea’s protector, China. 
 
 Trump said last week that North Korea was finally “starting to respect us,” although he added that his threat to answer the country’s provocations with “fire and fury” might not have been strong enough. 
 
 Tillerson also had publicly praised North Korea last week for showing “restraint” since the U.N. Security Council vote and in the face of the annual military drills. Although North Korea had not test-launched any missiles for nearly a month at that point, it has done so twice since Tillerson spoke. 
 
 North Korea fired rockets over the Japanese mainland in 1998 and 2009 — but it described them as satellite launch vehicles and gave Japan advance warning in the second case. Tuesday’s missile launch was purely military and “demonstrated a direct threat,” said Narushige Michishita, an expert on Korean Peninsula security issues at the Graduate Institute for Policy Studies in Tokyo. 
 
 “From a military point of view, they have demonstrated an ability to use a very mobile, agile missile against targets anywhere in Japan,” he said. 
 
 [ In a dangerous time, the Pentagon prepares for a war game on the Korean Peninsula ] 
 
 Defense Secretary Jim Mattis has said that the United States would shoot down any missile North Korea fired at Guam or a U.S. ally. 
 
 Fifield reported from Tokyo. 
 
 Read more 
 
 North Korea mocks Trump’s ‘ego-driven’ Twitter posts as military exercises continue 
 
 North Korea could cross ICBM threshold next year, U.S. officials warn in new assessment 
 
 Kim Jong Un’s rockets are getting an important boost — from China 
 
 Today’s coverage from Post correspondents around the world 
 
 Like Washington Post World on Facebook and stay updated on foreign news ||||| Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption US ambassador Nikki Haley: "Kim Jong-un is begging for war" 
 
 The US envoy to the UN has urged the Security Council to take the "strongest possible measures" against North Korea after its latest nuclear test. 
 
 "The time has come to exhaust all diplomatic means before it is too late," Nikki Haley told an emergency meeting of the council in New York. 
 
 The US will circulate a draft resolution, for a vote next Monday. 
 
 South Korea is poised to scrap a warhead weight limit on its own missiles after talks with the US. 
 
 President Moon Jae-in reached agreement by phone with his counterpart, Donald Trump. Missiles are currently capped at 500kg (1,100lb). 
 
 The country carried out live-fire exercises on Monday, simulating an attack on the North's nuclear test site. 
 
 Reports suggest the North is preparing new test missile launches. It tested a nuclear bomb underground on Sunday. Estimates of its power range from 50 kilotonnes to 120 kilotonnes. A 50kt device would be about three times the size of the bomb that destroyed Hiroshima in 1945. 
 
 In other developments: 
 
 German Chancellor Angela Merkel said she would press for tougher EU sanctions on North Korea, agreeing with Mr Trump by phone on the need for stricter sanctions 
 
 Swiss President Doris Leuthard said her country was prepared to act as a mediator and called for more discreet negotiations, saying "Twitter won't be an adequate instrument" 
 
 Japan is planning, in the event of war, for a mass evacuation of nearly 60,000 Japanese citizens currently living in or visiting South Korea, Nikkei Asian Review reports 
 
 'Begging for war' 
 
 Opening Monday's meeting, UN Under Secretary General Jeffrey Feltman said North Korea's actions were destabilising global security, and he called on Pyongyang to abide by Security Council resolutions. 
 
 "The DPRK [North Korea] is the only country that continues to break the norm against nuclear test explosions," he said. 
 
 Image copyright AFP Image caption The UN Security Council last imposed sanctions in August, targeting North Korean exports 
 
 Ms Haley argued that only the strongest sanctions would enable the problem to be resolved through diplomacy. 
 
 North Korean leader Kim Jong-un had shown through his actions that he was "begging for war", she said. 
 
 "War is never something the United States wants," she continued. "We don't want it now but our country's patience is not unlimited." 
 
 She was speaking after President Trump warned the US might consider stopping all trade with any country doing business with North Korea. 
 
 "The United States will look at every country that does business with North Korea as a country that is giving aid to their reckless and dangerous nuclear intentions," Ms Haley said. 
 
 The British ambassador to the UN, Matthew Rycroft, said direct talks with North Korea were only possible if Pyongyang stopped the escalation. 
 
 "Dialogue will always be our end goal but returning to dialogue without a serious sign of intent from Pyongyang would be a set-up to failure," he said. "North Korea must change course to allow a return to dialogue." 
 
 China's envoy to the UN, Liu Jieyi, reiterated a call for all sides to return to negotiations. "The peninsula issue must be resolved peacefully," he said. "China will never allow chaos and war on the peninsula." 
 
 What happens next? 
 
 By Jonathan Marcus, BBC defence and diplomatic correspondent 
 
 China is key but it is a conflicted party. On the one hand it does not want to see a nuclear-armed North Korea and it has made its view clear to Pyongyang on many occasions. 
 
 However, it does not want to see the North Korean regime swept away. This would result in millions of refugees flooding into China and would probably result in a unified Korea very much in the US orbit. This is seen in Beijing as worse than having a difficult nuclear neighbour. 
 
 If China were to take the view that the coincidence of a rapidly advancing North Korean nuclear programme and the uncertainties of the Trump administration's diplomatic capabilities means that there is a very real risk of misunderstanding and catastrophe, then maybe it might bring much greater pressure to bear on Pyongyang. 
 
 North Korea is a very isolated country and China is both its major ally and economic prop. There is a lot more that China can do. North Korea's recent testing has been as much an embarrassment to China as it has angered the US. But the Chinese have a difficult diplomatic calculation to make. 
 
 Full version of analysis 
 
 What other sanctions remain? 
 
 Last month, the Security Council voted unanimously to ban North Korean exports and limit investments in the country. 
 
 Ms Haley did not spell out what additional measures might be taken but diplomats have suggested an oil embargo would have a crippling effect. 
 
 There could also be a ban on the North's national airline, curbs on North Koreans working abroad, and asset freezes and travel bans on officials. 
 
 How big was the latest test? 
 
 It was North Korea's sixth and most powerful nuclear test to date. The US Geological Survey recorded a resulting tremor at 6.3 magnitude. 
 
 Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Nuclear N Korea: What do we know? 
 
 Kim Jong-un was pictured on camera being shown what state media said was a new type of hydrogen bomb. 
 
 South Korea said it was now presumed that the North had reduced its nuclear warhead in size to below 500kg, and would be able to attach one to an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM). 
 
 But analysts have said the North's claims about miniaturisation should be treated with considerable caution. 
 
 Earlier on Monday, a South Korean defence ministry official said there were signs of "possibly more ballistic missile launches", including an ICBM. 
 
 How else are the South and its US ally responding? 
 
 Monday's drills simulated the targeting of the Punggye-ri nuclear site in Kilju County, where North Korea carried out its bomb test. Missiles were fired from the ground and rockets from fighter jets. 
 
 Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption South Korea carries out live-fire drills in response to the nuclear test 
 
 The defence ministry in Seoul said there would be more live-fire drills in the South this month, involving Taurus air-to-surface missiles mounted on F-15 jets. 
 
 The ministry also told parliament the US would seek to deploy a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier to seas off the peninsula. 
 
 Four more launchers of the US Thaad (Terminal High-Altitude Area Defence) missile defence system -strongly opposed by China and Russia - would also be deployed to join two already at a site in Seongju, south of Seoul. 
 
 North Korea's nuclear tests ||||| SEOUL/NEW YORK (Reuters) - The United States flew two supersonic B-1B bombers over the Korean peninsula in a show of force on Sunday and the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations said China, Japan and South Korea needed to do more after Pyongyang’s latest missile tests. 
 
 North Korea said it conducted another successful test of an intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBM) on Friday that proved its ability to strike America’s mainland, drawing a sharp warning from U.S. President Donald Trump. 
 
 Trump’s ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley said on Twitter on Sunday that the United States was “done talking” about North Korea, which was “not only a U.S. problem.” 
 
 “China is aware they must act,” Haley said, urging Japan and South Korea to increase pressure and calling for an international solution. 
 
 China, the North’s main ally, said it opposed North Korea’s missile launches, which it said violate UN Security Council resolutions designed to curb Pyongyang’s banned nuclear and missile programs. 
 
 “At the same time, China hopes all parties act with caution, to prevent tensions from continuing to escalate,” China’s foreign ministry said in a statement on Saturday. 
 
 Early in his presidency, Trump met with Chinese President Xi Jinping and had expressed hope Beijing would use its economic clout to curb North Korea’s nuclear ambitions. 
 
 But on Saturday, Trump said on Twitter that he was “very disappointed in China” which he said profits from trade with the United States but does “NOTHING for us with North Korea, just talk. We will no longer allow this to continue,” he said. 
 
 DIRECT RESPONSE 
 
 North Korean leader Kim Jong Un personally supervised the midnight test launch of the missile on Friday night and said it was a “stern warning” for the United States that it would not be safe from destruction if it tries to attack, the North’s official KCNA news agency said. 
 
 North Korea’s state television broadcast pictures of the launch, showing the missile lifting off in a fiery blast in darkness and Kim cheering with military aides. 
 
 The missile test came a day after the U.S. Senate approved a package of sanctions against North Korea, Russia and Iran. 
 
 The B-1B flight was a response to the missile test and the July 3 launch of the “Hwasong-14” rocket, the Pentagon said. The bombers took off from a U.S. air base in Guam, and were joined by Japanese and South Korean fighter jets during the exercise, according to the statement. 
 
 “North Korea remains the most urgent threat to regional stability,” Pacific Air Forces commander General Terrence J. O’Shaughnessy said in a statement. 
 
 One of two U.S. Air Force B-1B Lancer bombers flies a 10-hour mission from Andersen Air Force Base, Guam, into Japanese airspace and over the Korean Peninsula, July 30, 2017. U.S. Air Force photo/Airman 1st Class Jacob Skovo/Handout via REUTERS. 
 
 “If called upon, we are ready to respond with rapid, lethal, and overwhelming force at a time and place of our choosing.” 
 
 Also on Sunday, the U.S. Missile Defense Agency announced the United States had successfully shot down a medium-range missile in the latest test of its THAAD missile defense program which is designed to protect the country against potential threats from countries such as North Korea and Iran. 
 
 The test was planned well before the rising tensions with North Korea and involved a medium-range missile, not the long-range types being tested by the North Koreans. 
 
 FAR REACH 
 
 The Hwasong-14, named after the Korean word for Mars, reached an altitude of 3,724.9 km (2,314.6 miles) and flew 998 km (620 miles)for 47 minutes and 12 seconds before landing in the waters off the Korean peninsula’s east coast, KCNA said. 
 
 Western experts said calculations based on that flight data and estimates from the U.S., Japanese and South Korean militaries showed the missile could have been capable of going as far into the United States as Denver and Chicago. 
 
 David Wright of the U.S.-based Union of Concerned Scientists wrote in a blog post that if it had flown on a standard trajectory, the missile would have had a range of 10,400 km (6,500 miles). 
 
 U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein, a leading Democrat on the Senate intelligence committee, said she saw the test as “a clear and present danger to the United States.” 
 
 Slideshow (8 Images) 
 
 “I think the only solution is a diplomatic one. I’m very disappointed in China’s response, that it has not been firmer or more helpful,” Feinstein told CBS television’s “Face the Nation,” urging the administration to begin talks with the North. 
 
 U.S. intelligence officials assess that even if North Korea does develop a reliable, nuclear-capable ICBM, which some say it remains several steps short of doing, the weapon would be almost useless except to deter the conventional attacks that Kim fears. 
 
 Intelligence experts have concluded that Kim will not abandon his pursuit of a deliverable nuclear weapon. 
 
 “Kim is determined to secure international recognition of the North as a nuclear armed state, for the purposes of security, prestige, and political legitimacy,” says the National Intelligence Council’s January Global Trends report. ||||| TV monitors show the J-Alert (warning siren) at an office of Kyodo News in Tokyo Friday, Sept. 15, 2017. South Korea's military said North Korea fired an unidentified missile Friday from its capital Pyongyang... (Associated Press) 
 
 UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The U.N. Security Council strongly condemned North Korea's "highly provocative" ballistic missile test on Friday and demanded that Pyongyang immediately halt its "outrageous actions" and demonstrate its commitment to denuclearizing the Korean peninsula. 
 
 The U.N.'s most powerful body accused North Korea of undermining regional peace and security by launching its latest missile over Japan and said its nuclear and missile tests "have caused grave security concerns around the world" and threaten all 193 U.N. member states. 
 
 North Korea's longest-ever test flight of a ballistic missile early Friday from Sunan, the location of Pyongyang's international airport, signaled both defiance of North Korea's rivals and a big technological advance. After hurtling over Japan, it landed in the northern Pacific Ocean. 
 
 Since U.S. President Donald Trump threatened North Korea with "fire and fury" in August, the North has conducted its most powerful nuclear test, threatened to send missiles into the waters around the U.S. Pacific island territory of Guam and launched two missiles of increasing range over Japan. July saw the country's first tests of intercontinental ballistic missiles that could strike deep into the U.S. mainland when perfected. 
 
 The intermediate-range missile test came four days after the Security Council imposed tough new sanctions on the North for its Sept. 3 missile test including a ban on textile exports and natural gas imports — and caps on its import of oil and petroleum products. The U.S. said the latest sanctions, combined with previous measures, would ban over 90 percent of North Korea's exports reported in 2016, its main source of hard currency used to finance its nuclear and missile programs. 
 
 North Korea's Foreign Ministry denounced the sanctions and said the North would "redouble its efforts to increase its strength to safeguard the country's sovereignty and right to existence." 
 
 The Security Council stressed in Friday's press statement after a closed-door emergency meeting that all countries must "fully, comprehensively and immediately" implement all U.N. sanctions. 
 
 Japan's U.N. Ambassador Koro Bessho called the launch an "outrageous act" that is not only a threat to Japan's security but a threat to the world as a whole." 
 
 Bessho and the British, French and Swedish ambassadors demanded that all sanctions be implemented. 
 
 Calling the latest launch a "terrible, egregious, illegal, provocative reckless act," Britain's U.N. Ambassador Matthew Rycroft said North Korea's largest trading partners and closest links — a clear reference to China — must "demonstrate that they are doing everything in their power to implement the sanctions of the Security Council and to encourage the North Korean regime to change course." 
 
 France's Foreign Ministry said in a statement that the country is ready to work on tougher U.N. and EU measures to convince Pyongyang that there is no interest in an escalation, and to bring it to the negotiating table. It said North Korea will also be discussed during next week's annual gathering of world leaders at the General Assembly. 
 
 The Security Council also emphasized the importance of North Korea working to reduce tension in the Korean Peninsula — and it reiterated the importance of maintaining peace and stability on the territory divided between authoritarian North Korea and democratic South Korea. 
 
 The council welcomed efforts by its members and other countries "to facilitate a peaceful and comprehensive solution" to the North Korean nuclear issue through dialogue. 
 
 Russia's U.N. Ambassador, Vassily Nebenzia, strongly backed the need for dialogue saying the United States needs to start talks with North Korea, which the Trump administration has ruled out. 
 
 Nebenzia told reporters after the meeting that Russia called on the U.S. and others to implement the "political and diplomatic solutions" called for in the latest sanctions resolution. 
 
 "Without implementing this, we also will consider it as a non-compliance with the resolution," Nebenzia said, adding that it also may be time for the council to "think out of the box" on how to deal with North Korea. 
 
 The growing frequency, power and confidence displayed by Pyongyang's nuclear and missile tests seem to confirm what governments and outside experts have long feared: North Korea is closer than ever to its goal of building a military arsenal that can viably target U.S. troops both in Asia and in the U.S. homeland. 
 
 This, in turn, is meant to allow North Korea greater military freedom in the region by raising doubts in Seoul and Tokyo that Washington would risk the annihilation of a U.S. city to protect its Asian allies. 
 
 South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff said the latest missile traveled about 3,700 kilometers (2,300 miles) and reached a maximum height of 770 kilometers (478 miles). Guam, which is the home of important U.S. military assets, is 3,400 kilometers (2,112 miles) away from North Korea. 
 
 Despite its impressive range, the missile probably still is not accurate enough to destroy Guam's Andersen Air Force Base, said David Wright, a U.S. missile expert with the Union of Concerned Scientists. 
 
 South Korean President Moon Jae-in, a liberal who initially pushed for talks with North Korea, said its tests currently make dialogue "impossible." 
 
 "If North Korea provokes us or our allies, we have the strength to smash the attempt at an early stage and inflict a level of damage it would be impossible to recover from," he said. 
 
 North Korea has repeatedly vowed to continue its weapons tests amid what it calls U.S. hostility — by which it means the presence of nearly 80,000 U.S. troops stationed in Japan and South Korea. 
 
 Robust international diplomacy on the issue has been stalled for years, and there's so far little sign that senior officials from North Korea and the U.S. might sit down to discuss ways to slow the North's determined march toward inclusion among the world's nuclear weapons powers. 
 
 South Korea detected North Korean launch preparations Thursday, and President Moon ordered a live-fire ballistic missile drill if the launch happened. This allowed Seoul to fire missiles only six minutes after the North's launch Friday. One of the two missiles hit a sea target about 250 kilometers (155 miles) away, which was approximately the distance to Pyongyang's Sunan, but the other failed in flight shortly after launch. 
 
 ___ 
 
 Kim reported from Seoul. Associated Press writers Foster Klug in Seoul and Mari Yamaguchi in Tokyo contributed to this report. ||||| Nuclear-armed North Korea said Tuesday its missile launches were training for a strike on US bases in Japan, as global condemnation of the regime swelled. 
 
 Three of the four missiles fired Monday came down provocatively close to US ally Japan, in waters that are part of its exclusive economic zone, representing a challenge to US President Donald Trump. 
 
 In separate phone calls, Trump -- whose rhetoric on the campaign trail had raised doubts about the issue -- reaffirmed Washington's "ironclad commitment" to Japan and South Korea. 
 
 The US will demonstrate to Pyongyang that there were "very dire consequences" for its actions, the White House said in a statement. 
 
 The United Nations Security Council scheduled an emergency meeting for Wednesday after a request by Washington and Tokyo to discuss additional measures following the launch. 
 
 Under UN resolutions, Pyongyang is barred from any use of ballistic missile technology, and the US ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley, said on Twitter that the world "won't allow" North Korea to continue on its "destructive path". 
 
 But six sets of UN sanctions since its first nuclear test in 2006 have failed to halt its drive for what it insists are defensive weapons. 
 
 - 'Feasting his eyes' - 
 
 Kim Jong-Un gave the order for the drill to start, the North's official Korea Central News Agency (KCNA) reported. 
 
 "Feasting his eyes on the trails of ballistic rockets", he praised the Hwasong artillery unit that carried it out, it said. 
 
 "The four ballistic rockets launched simultaneously are so accurate that they look like acrobatic flying corps in formation, he said," the agency added, referring to Kim. 
 
 The military units involved are "tasked to strike the bases of the US imperialist aggressor forces in Japan in contingency", KCNA said. 
 
 The Korean version of the KCNA report said the North's missile launch demonstrated its readiness to "wipe out" enemy forces with a "merciless nuclear strike". 
 
 A series of photographs published by the North's Rodong Sinmun newspaper showed Kim watching the missiles rise into the air and another of him smiling gleefully, clapping with other officials. 
 
 Seoul and Washington last week began annual joint military exercises that always infuriate Pyongyang. 
 
 It regularly issues threats against its enemies, and carried out two atomic tests and a series of missile launches last year, but Monday was only the second time its devices have come down in Japan's EEZ. 
 
 The launches came ahead of a trip by new US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson to the region. 
 
 Choi Kang, an analyst at the Seoul-based Asan Institute for Policy Studies, said the launch was a warning to Tokyo. 
 
 "North Korea is demonstrating that its target is not just limited to the Korean peninsula anymore but can extend to Japan at anytime and even the US," he said. 
 
 Trump has described North Korea as a "big, big problem" and vowed to deal with the issue "very strongly". 
 
 White House spokesman Sean Spicer said Monday the administration was taking steps to "enhance our ability to defend against North Korea's ballistic missiles". 
 
 The New York Times reported at the weekend that under former president Barack Obama the US stepped up cyber attacks against North Korea to try to sabotage its missiles before launch or just as they lift off. 
 
 - Beijing frustrated - 
 
 The US military has begun deploying the THAAD anti-ballistic missile defense system to South Korea to protect against threats from the North, US Pacific Command said, with its first elements arriving on Monday. 
 
 Pyongyang wants to develop an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) capable of reaching the US mainland -- something Trump has vowed would not happen. 
 
 It has undoubtedly made progress in its efforts in recent years, although questions remain over its ability to master re-entry technology and miniaturise a nuclear weapon sufficiently to fit it onto a missile warhead. 
 
 The THAAD deployment has infuriated China, the North's key diplomatic ally and crucial to efforts to persuade it to change its ways, and it has imposed several steps seen as economic retaliation against South Korea. 
 
 Foreign ministry spokesman Geng Shuang said Tuesday that Beijing remained "firmly opposed" to THAAD and will "resolutely take necessary measures to defend our own security interests". ||||| Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption It's not the first time North Korea has made threats against Guam 
 
 North Korea says a plan that could see it fire four missiles near the US territory of Guam will be ready in a matter of days. 
 
 State media said Hwasong-12 rockets would pass over Japan and land in the sea about 30km (17 miles) from Guam, if the plan was approved by Kim Jong-un. 
 
 It denounced Donald Trump's warnings of "fire and fury" and said the US leader was "bereft of reason". 
 
 The US has warned the North its actions could mean the "end of its regime". 
 
 US Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis said Pyongyang would be "grossly overmatched" in any war against the US and its allies. 
 
 The BBC's Rupert Wingfield-Hayes, who is in Guam, says there is a sense that the North Korean threat is rhetorical, as most people feel that if they really did strike with missiles it would be suicidal for the North Korean regime. 
 
 Separately, the European Union said it was freezing the assets of nine more people and four more entities, including North Korea's Foreign Trade Bank, in line with fresh sanctions approved by the UN Security Council on Saturday. 
 
 What is the North planning? 
 
 The North first announced on Wednesday that it had been drawing up plans for a missile strike against Guam, a Pacific island which is home to US military bases, strategic bombers and about 163,000 people. 
 
 A later statement carried by state media said the military would "finally complete the plan" by mid-August and send it to leader Kim Jong-un for his approval. 
 
 Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption The BBC's Robin Brant asks those in the South Korean capital, Seoul: "Are you scared?" 
 
 "The Hwasong-12 rockets to be launched by the KPA [Korean People's Army] will cross the sky above Shimane, Hiroshima and Koichi [Kochi] Prefectures of Japan," state news agency KCNA said, quoting army chief General Kim Rak Gyom. 
 
 "They will fly 3,356.7km for 1,065 seconds and hit the waters 30-40km away from Guam." 
 
 The Hwasong missiles are North Korea's domestically produced medium and long-range weapons. 
 
 What has been the reaction in the region? 
 
 The governor of Guam addressed the North's new statement on Thursday, telling Reuters news agency that North Korea usually likes to be unpredictable and has fired surprise missiles in the past. 
 
 "They're now telegraphing their punch, which means they don't want to have any misunderstandings. I think that's a position of fear," said Governor Eddie Calvo. 
 
 Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption North Koreans rally to denounce 'gangster' US 
 
 Meanwhile Japanese government spokesman Yoshihide Suga said Pyongyang's actions were "provocative to the region including Japan as well as to the security of the international community". 
 
 "We can never tolerate this," he added. 
 
 Defence Minister Itsunori Onodera told MPs Japan could legally intercept a North Korean missile headed for Guam because such a move would threaten Japan's existence as a nation. 
 
 Recent legislation also allows Japan to defend the US and other allies from attack. Previously Japan's position was only to shoot down missiles headed for its own territory. 
 
 South Korea's military said it was prepared for swift action. 
 
 "If North Korea conducts provocation in defiance of our military's grave warning, it will confront the strong and firm response of our military and the US-South Korea alliance," Joint Chiefs of Staff spokesman Roh Jae-cheon said. 
 
 The foreign ministry in Seoul, meanwhile, urged Pyongyang to respond to its recent offer of new dialogue. 
 
 China has urged calm, describing the situation as "complex and sensitive". 
 
 What have the two sides been saying? 
 
 North Korean state media said President Trump's remarks on Tuesday that the North risked "fire and fury" for threatening the US were "a load of nonsense". 
 
 "Sound dialogue is not possible with such a guy bereft of reason and only absolute force can work on him," it added. 
 
 Amid escalating rhetoric, Mr Mattis issued a strongly worded statement on Wednesday calling on Pyongyang to halt its arms programme. 
 
 Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Trump will use "any appropriate measures" - adviser Sebastian Gorka 
 
 "While our state department is making every effort to resolve this global threat through diplomatic means, it must be noted that the combined allied militaries now possess the most precise, rehearsed and robust defensive and offensive capabilities on Earth," he said. 
 
 Mr Trump, who is holidaying in New Jersey, boasted about America's atomic arsenal earlier on Wednesday. 
 
 The tiny but important island of Guam 
 
 The 541sq km (209 sq miles) volcanic and coral island in the Pacific between the Philippines and Hawaii. 
 
 It is a "non-incorporated" US territory, with a population of about 163,000. 
 
 That means people born in Guam are US citizens, have an elected governor and House Representative, but cannot vote for a president in US national elections. 
 
 US military bases cover about a quarter of the island. About 6,000 personnel are based there and there are plans to move in thousands more. 
 
 It was a key US base in World War Two, and remains a vital staging post for US operations, giving access to potential flashpoints like the South China Sea, the Koreas and the Taiwan Straits. 
 
 Should we be worried? 
 
 US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson has sought to reassure Americans that North Korea does not pose an imminent threat. 
 
 On Wednesday, he said the situation had not dramatically changed over the past few days, and that Americans "should sleep well at night". 
 
 South Korea's military says it has not seen any unusual action in the North that might indicate a provocation. 
 
 Despite rounds of UN sanctions, Pyongyang carried out two nuclear tests last year and two intercontinental ballistic missile tests in July. 
 
 Various reports recently have suggested the North has now achieved its goal of making a nuclear warhead small enough to fit inside its missiles. 
 
 But this remains unconfirmed, and most analysts doubt the country would launch a pre-emptive attack on the US.
– "Are we really willing to risk Los Angeles or Chicago in retaliation for an attack on a US military base in the region? Probably not," nuclear strategy specialist Vipin Narang tells the AP. And that's exactly the calculation that gives North Korea a small shot at "winning" in a nuclear conflict, challenging the assumption that launching a nuclear weapon would be automatic suicide for the country. If North Korea feels threatened to the point of using a nuclear weapon, a first target would likely be a US military base in Japan; North Korea would then use its long-range nukes to threaten the US mainland and avoid a retaliatory strike. Experts say this is Kim Jong Un's "theory of victory"—one that President Trump may be attempting to combat with an unsuccessful version of the "madman strategy." Here's what else you need to know about North Korea's most-recent missile launch: Tuesday's missile launch over Japan seems likely to result in even more sanctions against North Korea. But after UN sanctions Aug. 5 targeted millions of dollars in seafood, coal, iron ore, and more, is there anything left to sanction? CNN reports two options are oil and Chinese banks. After Tuesday's missile launch, Trump said "all options are on the table." This was, all things considered, a "measured" response from the president, according to the Atlantic. It was an official statement instead of a tweet, didn't threaten "fire and fury," and avoided calling Kim Jong Un a "wack job." The Guardian reports on the scary morning had by residents of Japan, who were awoken around 6am Tuesday by a government missile warning on their phones. They were given less than 10 minutes to get to a shelter or sturdy building as sirens and special broadcasts blared. The missile test impacted US markets, with the Dow dropping more than 100 points Tuesday morning, Reuters reports. The stock market would recover by the afternoon as the threat passed. Korea expert Stephan Haggard tells the Washington Post that Tuesday was another example of how "weirdly conservative" Kim Jong Un is—carrying out provocative actions with just enough restraint to avoid an actual response. For example, pointing the missile toward Japan, not Guam. Finally, Russia's deputy foreign minister blamed the US and South Korea for Tuesday's nuclear test and came out against further sanctions against North Korea, saying they haven't prevented missile tests in the past and won't in the future, Newsweek reports.