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<\/a><\/p>\n(Reuters) -Russia will conduct missile launches and torpedo tests as part of a surprise inspection of its Pacific naval fleet, Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu said on Friday.<\/p>\n
The drills come amid heightened tension in the Asia-Pacific region, as the United States and South Korea conduct joint air exercises following an intercontinental ballistic missile test by North Korea.<\/p>\n
“The main objective of this inspection is to increase the ability of the Armed Forces to repel the aggression of a probable enemy from the direction of ocean and sea,” Shoigu said on state television.<\/p>\n
Chief of General Staff Valery Gerasimov said Russia’s naval forces would be put on high alert during the drills and deployed to training areas, where they will conduct combat exercises.<\/p>\n
The drills will also simulate an enemy landing on Russia’s Sakhalin island and on its southern Kuril Islands, some of which are claimed by Japan in a territorial dispute dating back to the end of World War Two.<\/p>\n
Asked about the exercises, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov played down any connection with regional tensions.<\/p>\n
“This is a common practice, it has been constantly carried out in recent years and it continues. This is about maintaining the necessary level of combat readiness of our armed forces,” Peskov told a daily news briefing.<\/p>\n
In other recent military activity in the area, Russia’s navy fired supersonic anti-ship missiles at a mock target in the Sea of Japan on March 28. <\/p>\n
Russia also flew two strategic bomber planes over the Sea of Japan for more than seven hours earlier in March, just as Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida was starting a visit to Ukraine to show solidarity with Kyiv in its war with invading Russian forces.<\/p>\n
(Reporting by Caleb Davis; Writing by Gareth Jones; Editing by Alex Richardson)<\/p>\n
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