North Korea fired a suspected ballistic missile in what would be the first test since the nuclear-armed country conducted a record number of launches in January, Japan’s coast guard has said.

South Korea also reported that Pyongyang had fired at least one “unidentified projectile” eastward.

The launch came less than two weeks ahead of a 9 March presidential election in South Korea.

The incident will stoke fears by some in Seoul that North Korea may push ahead with missile development while international attention is focused on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

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“Putin’S War shapes almost all geopolitics right now, and should factor somewhere in Kim’€™s cauculus – but even ‘taking advantage of distraction’ seems to presume too much, since (North Korea) was already testing aggressively before the war,” John Delury, a professor at South Korea‘s Yonsei University, said on Twitter.

North Korea‘s last test was on 30 January when it fired a Hwasong-12 intermediate range ballistic missile, the largest weapon fired since 2017. That capped a record month of mostly short-range missile launches in January.

There was no immediate comment from the Pentagon or the US State Department on Sunday’s launch.

Washington says it is open to talks with North Korea without preconditions, but Pyongyang has so far rejected those overtures as insincere.

North Korea‘s ballistic missile launches are banned by United Nations Security Council resolutions, which have imposed sanctions on the country over its missile and nuclear weapons programmes.

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