Category News

South Korea’s military reported that this was its first missile launch in a while as North Korea fired at least one ballistic missile at waters off its eastern coast.

The Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit, which will feature world leaders including Chinese President Xi Jinping and US President Donald Trump, will take place in Gyeongju, South Korea, on Wednesday morning.

According to the official South Korean Yonhap news agency, “at least one unidentified ballistic missile” was fired towards the East Sea, which is also known as the Sea of Japan.

The most recent launch is the first under Lee Jae-myung’s new presidency, which took office in June, according to Yonhap reports that North Korea last fired short-range ballistic and cruise missiles towards the East Sea on May 8 and May 22.

According to the Associated Press news agency, experts warned that North Korea might launch provocative missile tests in response to its commitment to being recognized as a nuclear-armed state before or during the APEC summit.

During a massive military parade in Pyongyang, where top Chinese, Russian, and other leaders were present, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un debuted a new long-range Hwasong-20 Intercontinental Ballistic Missile (ICBM), which he called the “most powerful,” earlier this month.

Kim’s strengthening diplomatic ties on a regional and global scale and his persistent efforts to develop sophisticated weapons capable of carrying nuclear payloads were highlighted at the parade, which marked the 80th anniversary of the founding of North Korea’s ruling Workers’ Party.

Pyongyang has long opposed international restrictions on the development of weapons, calling them necessary to shield North Korea from US and South Korean potential attacks.

Trump recently stated that he hopes to meet Kim again, possibly this year, after having previously met the North Korean leader during his first term in office.

On Wednesday, October 22, 2025, how things are going:

Fighting

In Novhorod-Siverskyi, in the Chernihiv region of Ukraine, a “massive” Russian attack claimed the lives of four people and injured seven, according to Governor Viacheslav Chaus’ post on Telegram.
• According to Chaus, there was “a lot of destruction in the city” as a result of Russian forces’ firing of about 20 Shahed drones during the attack.
• In the city of Kostiantynivka in the Donetsk region of Ukraine, Serhii Horbunov, the head of the Kostiantynivka City Military Administration, wrote in a Facebook post that two people were killed and one was hurt by Russian attacks.
• Nine people were hurt in a Sumy region of Ukraine as a result of a Russian drone attack, according to governor Oleh Hryhorov.
• According to the newly installed Russian-led governor, Vladimir Saldo, a Ukrainian attack on a region of southern Ukraine in which one person was killed and five were injured.
• According to regional authorities, one person was killed in a Ukrainian drone attack in Novostroyevka-Pervaya in the Belgorod Region of Russia, according to the state-run TASS news agency.
• According to the Ministry of Energy of Ukraine on Tuesday, Russian energy-related attacks in Ukraine’s Chernihiv region resulted in hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians without electricity.
• According to local authorities and TASS, more than 1, 000 people were without electricity as a result of a Ukrainian attack on the Kamianka-Dniprovska region of Russian-occupied Ukraine.
• The Bryansk chemical plant in Russia was struck by Ukrainian forces, according to a Facebook post from the Ukrainian General Staff, adding that the “result of the strike is being evaluated.”

diplomacy and politics

A senior White House official stated to Al Jazeera that “there are no plans for]US President Donald] President Vladimir Putin to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin in the immediate future,” days after Trump had suggested a meeting could take place in Hungary “within two weeks or so.”
• Trump addressed the situation in the Oval Office, saying, “I don’t want a wasted meeting… I don’t want a waste of time, so I’ll see what happens.”
• According to Dmitry Peskov, a spokesman for the Kremlin, “preparation is required, serious preparation,” any potential meeting could take some time.

• However, Kirill Dmitriev, Putin’s special envoy for investment and economic cooperation, claimed on X late on Tuesday that “the media is twisting comments about the upcoming Summit” and that “preparations continue” for the meeting between Trump and Putin.

The media is undermining the upcoming Summit by making up claims about the “immediate future.” The preparations continue. 🕊️🇷🇺🤝🇺🇸

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• Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the president of Ukraine, stated in his nightly address that the US appeared to have turned its back on the possibility of providing long-range Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine, leading to a decline in Moscow’s interest in the presidential meeting.
• Russia almost immediately lost interest in diplomacy as long-range mobility became a little further away from us, according to Zelenskyy.

Regional security

Robert Fico, the prime minister of Slovakia, was shot and injured last year, and he was found guilty of terrorism charges and given a 21-year prison sentence. The shooter claimed that Fico’s approach to Ukraine, which ended the country’s state-sponsored military assistance to Ukraine and sought to bolster ties with Moscow, was opposed.