Seoul, South Korea ? South Korea early today played down the significance of a North Korean missile test the day before, saying it involved a short-range missile without nuclear capabilities and warning against linking the issue to a dispute over the North’s atomic ambitions.

North Korea apparently test-fired a missile into the Sea of Japan on Sunday, raising new fears about Pyongyang’s nuclear intentions just days after a U.S. intelligence official said the secretive Stalinist state could arm a missile with a nuclear warhead.

A South Korean police officer looks at North Korea's Scud-B missile, center, and other missiles at Korea War Memorial Museum in Seoul, South Korea, in this March 10, 2003, file photo.

“The missile that North Korea recently fired is a short-range missile and is far from the one that can carry a nuclear weapon,” Deputy Foreign Minister Song Min-soon told South Korea’s Yonhap news agency. “This isn’t a case to be linked to the nuclear dispute.”

Six-nation talks — involving the United States, two Koreas, Russia, China and Japan — aimed at persuading North Korea to give up its nuclear ambitions have been stalled since June.

South Korean officials have said they have not detected any signs that Pyongyang is preparing for a nuclear test.

News of the test launch first appeared in Japanese media, which cited U.S. military officials as having informed the Japanese and South Korean governments of Sunday’s test launch, which took the missile about 65 miles off the North Korean coast.

Later, White House chief of staff Andrew Card said there was an apparent test.

In Japan, a Defense Agency official said on condition of anonymity today that Tokyo believes the missile only flew an extremely short distance and would not pose an immediate threat to Japan’s national security.