South Korea says North Korea has fired three short-range missiles off its west coast.

South Korea's Yonhap news agency said Saturday that the missiles were fired Friday into the Yellow Sea off Jeungsan County, about 40 kilometers west of the North Korean capital of Pyongyang.

Quoting a government source, Yonhap said the testing was part of a military training exercise involving ship-to-ship missiles with a range of 46 kilometers.

The North's navy fired three ship-to-ship missiles on March 28th in what was then described by the South Korean government as part of a regular military exercise in the waters off the peninsula's west coast.

A White House spokesman, Gordon Johndroe, described the tests in March as "not constructive," and urged North Korea to instead focus on dismantling its nuclear facilities.

Some information for this report was provided by AFP.