The People’s Liberation Army Rocket Force fired the missile at 8:44 a.m. local time on Wednesday and it ‘landed in the predetermined sea area.’
China has test-fired an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) into the Pacific Ocean, its first such test since 1980.
The Defence Ministry in Beijing said Wednesday’s launch was not directed at any country or target and was in line with international law.
The ministry said the missile was launched by the People’s Liberation Army Rocket Force (PLARF) at 8:44 a.m. local time and, “accurately landed in the predetermined sea area.”
The CCP regime said it was a, “routine arrangement in our annual training plan.”
Japan’s Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshimasa Hayashi told a press conference in Tokyo the Japanese government had not been notified of the launch in advance by China. According to the local Kyodo news agency, Hayashi said the missile did not pass over Japan and did not damage any Japanese ships.
Former Pentagon official Drew Thompson, who now works at Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy in Singapore, wrote on X: “China issued a notice to airmen and mariners that the mock warhead would splash down in the Tahiti Flight Information Region, in French Polynesia‘s EEZ. Something for Macron to consider as China proposes a peace plan for Ukraine.”
Thompon added: “The missile’s second and third stages came down near the Philippines. That does not make it a signal specifically for the Philippines. Anything China shoots , flies or sails into the Pacific has to go over or through the first island chain.”
The Chinese military has been increasingly flexing its muscles in the Asia-Pacific region, and has regularly clashed with Taiwan, the Philippines, Japan and Vietnam.
Wednesday’s missile test came as the United Nations General Assembly met in New York. China is one of five permanent members of the UN Security Council and is seeking to gain influence over key departments, including human rights.
Jeffrey Lewis, a missile expert at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies in California, said: “We’re entering a new age. We’re entering an age where the United States and China are engulfed in what feels like an arms race.”
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