Tokyo is some 1,300 kilometers (800 miles) east of Pyongyang and can be hit by a medium-range missile. Japanese broadcaster NHK said the missile launched Sunday flew 100 kilometers (62 miles) from North Korea into the Sea of Japan.

"It was like a normal domestic military drill. It has no impact" on Japan's security, said Chief Cabinet Secretary Hiroyuki Hosoda, the government spokesman, as quoted by Jiji Press.

"The missile is intended for surrounding waters (of North Korea) and it is not like having a range of several hundreds of kilometers," he said.

Hosoda said the launch did not violate a joint declaration between Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi and North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il reached after a September 2002 summit.

The Pyongyang declaration said North Korea would "maintain the moratorium on missile launching." It has been interpreted as pertaining to long-range missiles as it followed a unilateral ban by North Korea imposed in 1999.

That ban came a year after North Korea rattled its neighbors by test-firing a Taepodong-1 long-range missile over Japan and into the Pacific Ocean.

Short-range missile launches have been more routine, but have often been timed to send signals. North Korea's last high-profile launches were in March 2003 when it lobbed two short-range missiles into the Sea of Japan coinciding with the inauguration of South Korean President Roh Moo-Hyun.

Japanese Defense Agency Director-General Yoshinori Ono questioned the timing of the latest North Korean launch.

"Why would they have to conduct such a test when suspicions over nuclear and missile development have been cast over them," Ono said on a visit to the Philippines, as quoted by Kyodo News.

But he added: "As long as it is short-range, it would not cause problems to Japan's security."

A Japanese government official who declined to be named said the missile "is believed to have only flown for an extremely short distance."

"We do not think it would affect our country's security even if it is true that the missile was fired," the official told AFP.

The latest North Korean action could heighten concerns about its intentions as it continues to boycott six-nation talks on its nuclear arms program.

White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card, who confirmed the missile test Sunday, called for coordination among allies against North Korea.

"We have to work together with our allies around the world -- especially the Japanese, the South Koreans, the Russians and the Chinese -- to demonstrate that North Korea's actions are inappropriate," Card said.

Japan is a close US ally but Koizumi has invested political capital in trying to engage the Stalinist state, travelling twice to Pyongyang for summits.

Japan is locked in a separate standoff with North Korea over the communist state's abductions of Japanese nationals up to the 1980s. Koizumi has resisted calls to punish the isolated state with sanctions, pursuing a policy of "dialogue and pressure."

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