North Korea's official KCNA news agency announced on Friday that the test carried out one day earlier had been a success.

KCNA reported that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un had "guided the test-launch of newly developed cutting-edge ultra-precision tactical guided missiles."

"The test-launch helped the Korean People's Army get the master key to putting all strike means including short-, medium- and long-range guided weapons on ultra-precision basis of the world level and opened a prospect for maximizing their striking accuracy and power," it added.

"Kim Jong Un expressed great satisfaction."

South Korea's Yonhap news agency reported that the announcement likely referred to the firing of three rockets into the seas east of the Korean peninsula on Thursday.

Although the statement failed to give details about the type of rocket that was tested, some analysts have said that based on a recently broadcast propaganda film, at appeared to be a variant of Russia's KH-35 cruise missile.

Threat of a 'devastating strike'

The test coincided with a statement from the North Korean military released via KCNA, in which it condemned South Korean live fire exercises.

The statement described the exercises, which were carried out near that two countries' maritime border in the Yellow Sea as an act of "reckless provocation." It also said that frontline North Korean army units had completed preparations for a "devastating strike" on the South.

Some have also suggested that an expected visit to Seoul by Chinese President Xi Jingping may have put Pyongyang on edge, even more so than usual.

The two countries remain technically at war as the fighting in the 1950-53 Korean War ended with a ceasefire as opposed to a peace agreement.

pfd/ipj (AFP, dpa)