Free Republic

(3rd LD) N. Korea fails 1st mid-range ballistic missile launch: military 2016/04/15 15:46 (ATTN: RECASTS headline, lead; UPDATES throughout) SEOUL, April 15 (Yonhap) -- North Korea conducted its first test-launch of the medium-range ballistic missile Musudan early Friday from its east coast, but the launch ended in failure, officials said. "North Korea seems to have tried a missile launch from the East Sea area in the early morning today, but it is presumed to have failed," the Joint Chiefs of Staff said. Sources said the launched missile was the Musudan intermediate-range ballistic missile (IRBM), also known as the BM-25. The...

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - The United States reaffirmed on Friday it expected Iran to give a formal reply to a package of incentives to curb its nuclear activities at a meeting between its chief negotiator and European officials on July 5. "We expect and hope that (Ali) Larijani will give us the answer," UnderSecretary of State Nicholas Burns told a news briefing, referring to Iran's chief nuclear negotiator. "We always said that this is a process of weeks not months," he said, adding that the offer put to Iran was "quite straightforward". He said the five permanent members of the U.N....

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Iran has received a first shipment of missiles from North Korea that are capable of reaching Europe, Israel's military intelligence chief was quoted on Thursday as saying. Known in the West as BM-25s, the Russian-designed missiles have a range of around 2,500 km (1,500 miles), giving them a longer reach than the Iranian-made Shihab-4 missiles which are capable of hitting Israel. The intelligence chief, Major-General Amos Yadlin, was quoted by Israel's Haaretz newspaper as saying in a lecture on Wednesday that some BM-25s had arrived in Iran. The BM-25 was originally manufactured in the Soviet Union, where...