N Korea tests ‘super-large’ rocket launchers

Nuclear-armed North Korea successfully tested "super-large multiple rocket launchers", state media said yesterday, but leader Kim Jong Un was not described as commanding the drill as analysts say Pyongyang seeks to normalise its launches. With the world focused on the coronavirus pandemic and North Korea insisting it has not had a single Covid-19 case, the isolated state has carried out four such firings this month. Unusually, the official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) did not say in its report that Kim had directed Sunday's test. The leader is almost always shown overseeing the North's launches but on this occasion KCNA said it was led by ruling party vice chairman Ri Pyong Chol and conducted by the Academy of National Defence Science.