North Korea has fired an intercontinental ballistic missile, which flew for 86 minutes - the longest flight recorded yet - before falling into waters off its east, South Korea and Japan said.

The ICBM was fired at a sharply-raised angle and reached as high as 7,000km (4,350 miles). This means that it would have covered a further distance if it were launched horizontally.

Thursday’s launch violated UN curbs and came at a time of deteriorating relations between the two Koreas and Pyongyang’s increasingly aggresive rhetoric towards Seoul.

South Korea had also warned on Wednesday that the North was preparing to fire its ICBM close to the US presidential election on 5 November.