"No matter how desperately the U.S. may find fault with the DPRK ( Democratic People's Republic of Korea), it will continue to hold drills of launching high-precision tactical guided missiles, targeting the citadel of the gangsters who go mischievous," the North's official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said, quoting remarks by a spokesman for the Strategic Force of the Korean People's Army.

The North claimed that its test-firing of guided missiles is "the righteous exercise of its sovereignty" to defend itself from "the U.S. aggression and war moves," the KCNA said in an English-language dispatch.

The report comes as Chinese President Xi's visit to Seoul can be seen as a snub to North Korea because Xi chose to travel to South Korea first instead of the North. China is the North's longtime ally and largest economic benefactor.

South Korea's Unification Ministry spokesman Kim Eui-do said at a regular press briefing Wednesday that the North should stop such provocations that could stoke military tensions on the Korean Peninsula.

U.S. State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said Wednesday that Pyongyang's missile launches are intended to unilaterally heighten tensions in the region, saying that its provocative acts won't get the communist regime what it wants.