North Korea says it will launch its first military spy satellite in June (updated)
29/05/2023 22:49
(Adds Japan's chief cabinet secretary comment; paragraph 9)
By Soo-hyang Choi
SEOUL, May 30 (Reuters) - North Korea will launch its
first military reconnaissance satellite in June for monitoring
U.S. military activities, state media KCNA reported on Tuesday.
In a statement carried by the KCNA news agency, Ri Pyong
Chol, vice-chairman of the Central Military Commission of the
ruling Workers' Party, denounced joint military exercises by the
United States and South Korea as openly showing their "reckless
ambition for aggression."
U.S. and South Korean forces have carried out various
training exercises in recent months, including what they said
were the biggest joint live-fire exercises last week, after many
drills were scaled back amid COVID-19 restrictions and hopes for
diplomatic efforts with North Korea.
North Korea's Ri said the drills required Pyongyang to have
the "means capable of gathering information about the military
acts of the enemy in real time."
"We will comprehensively consider the present and future
threats and put into more thoroughgoing practice the activities
for strengthening all-inclusive and practical war deterrents,"
Ri said in the statement.
Nuclear-armed North Korea has said it has completed
development of its first military spy satellite, and leader Kim
Jong Un has approved final preparations for the launch.
The statement did not specify the exact launch date, but
North Korea has notified Japan of the planned launch between May
31 and June 11, prompting Tokyo to put its ballistic missile
defences on alert.
Japan has said it would shoot down any projectile that
threatens its territory.
"(North Korea's) satellite launches incorporate
technology that is almost identical and compatible with those
used for ballistic missiles, and regardless of the designation
used by North Korea, we believe that the one planned for this
time also uses ballistic missile technology," Japan's Chief
Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno said on Tuesday.
A U.S. State Department spokesperson said on Monday any
North Korean launch that uses ballistic missile technology,
including those used to put a satellite in orbit, would violate
multiple United Nations resolutions.
The launch would be the North's latest in a series of
missile launches and weapons tests, including one of a new,
solid-fuel intercontinental ballistic missile last month.
Analysts say the satellite will improve North Korea's
surveillance capability, enabling it to strike targets more
accurately in the event of war.
(Reporting by Soo-hyang Choi; Additional reporting by Kaori
Kaneko in Tokyo; Editing by Leslie Adler, Grant McCool and Gerry
Doyle)
((soohyang.choi@thomsonreuters.com;))