However, spokesman Won Tae Jae declined to confirm whether the unit is an independent military division as an earlier news report said.

Won noted South Korea's 2008 Defense White Paper mentioned North Korea's deployment of intermediate-range ballistic missiles after starting development in the late 1990s.

"For our part, it is naturally believed there is a military unit to operate such a weapons system that has come into being," Won said.

Won's remarks were in response to a report by Yonhap News Agency that North Korea has recently established an independent military division in charge of deploying and operating intermediate-range ballistic missiles.

"We believe North Korea has set up a division under its Korean People's Army General Staff charged solely with arranging and controlling new intermediate-range missiles," a South Korean government source was quoted by Yonhap as saying.

"We believe the operation of this separate unit indicates North Korea's intention to produce new IRBMs," the source was quoted as saying, adding the weapon poses a threat to the security of the Korean peninsula as well as the U.S. 7th Fleet, based in Yokosuka, Japan.