North Korea fires ballistic missile, South Korea military says

North Korea fired a short-range ballistic missile over the Sea of Japan on Thursday, Seoul’s military said, with the launch coming after Pyongyang lambasted Japan’s military build-up in the Pacific. North Korea, which since 2019 has repeatedly declared itself an “irreversible” nuclear state, featured among growing regional threats in a recent Japanese government assessment. Tokyo’s Defence Minister Shinjiro Koizumi said this week that Japan’s military needs to be boosted with a “sense of urgency and crisis”. In a statement carried by North Korean state media on Wednesday, Kim Yo Jong — the powerful sister of leader Kim Jong Un — said Pyongyang’s “leadership will set up additional military…