A North Korean media outlet has reported that two long-range strategic cruise missiles were test-launched at dawn on Saturday toward the Yellow Sea.

The ruling Workers' Party newspaper Rodong Sinmun reported on Sunday that a military unit conducted the firing drill from the mouth of a river in the western part of the country.

It said that the drill was for a simulated tactical nuclear attack.

The paper reported that the missiles flew along a figure-8 flight plan and covered the distance of 1,500 kilometers in about 2 hours 8 minutes. It added that simulated warheads detonated at an altitude of 150 meters above a target island.

The paper reported that the Central Military Commission of the Workers' Party ordered the test-firing as part of the drill in the face of joint military exercises by the United States and South Korea which recently took place.

The commission added that North Korea intends to make the US and South Korea understand "the situation that has reached a serious threat through the overpowering exercise of the war deterrence."

The South Korean military said on Saturday that the North had fired cruise missiles toward the Yellow Sea.

They are believed to be the ones that Pyongyang said it launched.

North Korean strategic cruise missiles are said to be difficult to intercept because they fly in an oval-shaped or figure-8 shaped trajectory.

North Korea said on August 21 that it had conducted a naval strategic cruise missile firing drill.