SEOUL (Sputnik) — On Monday, media reported that North Korea fired four ballistic missiles, and three landed in Japan's exclusive economic zone. Later, White House spokesman Sean Spicer said that the deployment of THAAD in South Korea was one of the retaliatory measures to defend against North Korea’s threat.
"In the evening [Korean time] on March 6, parts of THAAD arrived at the Osan Air Base, Gyeonggi province, and it has nothing to do with the current White House statement; and it is just a phase of the process of missile defense systems deployment, an agreement on which had been reached between [South] Korea and the United States. There is no connection between these two events, the parts of THAAD are being supplied in accordance with the agreements reached in July last year," the representative said, adding that the THAAD installment is not linked with the current political situation.
Seoul and Washington agreed to deploy the THAAD system, designed to intercept short, medium and intermediate ballistic missiles at the terminal incoming stage, in July 2016, amid South Korea's growing unease about Pyongyang's nuclear activities.
