Russia test-fires new ICBM

A Russian submarine in the Barents Sea has successfully test-fired a new ballistic missile, hitting a target on the Kamchatka peninsula on Russia's Pacific coast minutes later, the Ministry of Defence said.

"The launch was carried out from the submarine platform in line with military training. The rocket warhead arrived down range at the designated time," the ministry said in a statement.

The RSM-54, or Sineva, is a hybrid ballistic missile that in its final stages becomes a modified cruise missile. In this guise, the warhead cannot be targeted by anti-missile systems that rely on a ballistic trajectory for their calculations.

Tuesday's launch is the second such test-firing of the Sineva in less than a week. Speaking after the last successful launch, a general said Russia could thwart any anti-missile system in the foreseeable future.

"The military hardware now on our weapons, and those that will appear in the next few years, will enable our missiles to outperform any anti-missile system, including future systems," General Nikolai Solovtsov told journalists on Dec. 17.

Officials also announced the successful test-firing of a land-launched RS-24 missile with multiple warheads from the Plesetsk range in northern Russia.

A spokesman for Russian's Strategic Missile forces said the missile, first tested in May of this year, had hit its target in Kamchatka.

He said the missile boosted the deterrent force of Russia's strategic missiles and was intended to help outperform any missile defence system.

The United States plans to deploy a missile defence system in Central Europe. It says it is intended to defend against attacks by "rogue states", not Russia. Moscow says the system poses a security threat and has promised counter-measures.

The submarine-based test missile was fired from the Tula, one of seven Russian Dolphin-class vessels capable of carrying 16 intercontinental rockets and torpedoes, according to data published on the Russian Defence Ministry website.