North Korea test-fires missile

SEOUL, South Korea -- North Korea test-fired a missile into the sea Monday in what was seen as an attempt to raise tension further in the standoff over its nuclear programs and pressure the United States into negotiations.\nThe widely anticipated launch from a base on North Korea's east coast fit a pattern of unusual military maneuvers in recent weeks, including the North's interception a week ago of a U.S. reconnaissance plane.\n"This is another show of North Korean brinkmanship," said Yoon Dong-min, an expert at the state-funded Institute of Foreign Affairs and National Security in Seoul.\n"They are trying to raise the stakes in the nuclear standoff and trying to get the upper hand ahead of possible talks with the United States," Yoon said.\nNorth Korea wants a nonaggression treaty and economic aid from the United States, but Washington says the U.N. Security Council should handle the nuclear problem.\nIn Washington, top Bush administration officials said Sunday the time still isn't ripe for one-on-one talks with North Korea and any lasting solution to the nuclear dispute will need the support of Russia, China and other nations.\n"I think eventually we will be talking to North Korea, but we're not going to simply fall into what I believe is bad practice of saying the only way you can talk to us is directly, when it affects other nations in the region," Secretary of State Colin Powell said on CNN's "Late Edition."\nPowell, on Fox News Sunday, said during his visit to the United Nations last week, he worked with diplomats to develop a multinational approach to North Korea.\nDemocrats are pressing the Bush administration to begin direct talks immediately.\nNational security adviser Condoleezza Rice said on ABC's "This Week" that the United States isn't afraid to talk, "but we need to do so in a way that will bring maximum pressure on North Korea to actually this time not just freeze its weapons of mass destruction, but begin to dismantle them."\nThere had been indications that North Korea was planning to fire a missile. The Pentagon earlier cited a North Korean warning to ships to stay out of a sector off the east coast from Saturday to Tuesday.\nMaj. Kim Ki-Beom, a spokesman at the South Korean Defense Ministry, said the missile was believed to be an anti-ship missile similar to one that North Korea test-fired Feb. 24, the eve of the inauguration of South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun.\nSouth Korean officials said the second missile was launched from a pad at Sinsang-ri and flew 68 miles. It had a range of 160 kilometers 99 miles.\nSouth Korea was trying to determine whether the new test was successful. It had said the earlier one was a failure since it appeared to have exploded in midair due to defects.\nThe United States had sought to minimize the significance of the earlier missile test, saying it involved a small weapon and not one of North Korea's stockpile of long-range ballistic missiles.\nU.S. and South Korean officials are more concerned about a possible North Korean test of a Taepodong-2 missile, which analysts believe is capable of reaching parts of the United States, though there are widespread doubts about its reach and accuracy. In 1998, North Korea test-fired a Taepodong-1 missile over Japan and into the Pacific.