Japan: The launch of a ballistic missile by North Korea has caused fear and confusion in Japan after a government-run alert system warned residents that the projectile could fall on or close to the northern Japanese island of Hokkaido.

The emergency broadcasting system, J-Alert, told millions of people in Hokkaido to take immediate cover after the North fired what appeared to be a long-range missile.

The system issued the evacuation warning just before 8 AM local time, but lifted it soon after, stating it had “erroneously” predicted that the missile would fall near the island.

But Japan’s government later declared that the emergency evacuation warning it issued and later retracted was appropriate and had not been made in error.

“We did not correct the information issued by J-Alert,” the chief cabinet secretary Mr. Hirokazu Matsuno commented during a news conference.

“The J-Alert warning was issued to inform citizens of the danger of a falling missile to prioritise citizens’ safety,” Mr. Matsuno noted.

According to South Korea’s military, it believes it was a new type of ballistic missile, possibly using solid fuel. If the launch involved a solid-fuel intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), it would be the North’s first test of such a weapon. Liquid fuel must be injected before the weapon is launched, but it is harder to detect launches of solid-propellant weapons in advance because the fuel is already loaded inside. North Korea’s previous ICBM tests all involved liquid-fueled weapons.

Mr. Matsuno remarked that the North Korean missile had disappeared from Japan’s radar immediately after detection, adding that further analysis had found that there was no possibility of it landing in Japan’s territory, prompting authorities to lift the evacuation warning.

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