12/12/12/North Korea launches a long-range rocket

North Korea launches a long-range rocket

Ahn Young-joon/AP - South Koreans watch a public TV reporting news about North Korea's rocket launch at Seoul Railway Station in Seoul, South Korea, on Wednesday.

TOKYO — North Korea defied Washington and its allies Wednesday by firing a long-range rocket carrying a satellite, a launch that Pyongyang’s state-run media described as a success.
Analysts cautioned that it was too early to confirm the North Korean report, noting that the North has previously announced successful launches when international tracking systems proved otherwise.

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A South Korean defense ministry spokesman said that the launch’s success was unclear.
If North Korea indeed placed a satellite into orbit, it would mark a major advance in its decades-long efforts to develop an intercontinental ballistic missile capable of hitting the United States and present a new threat for the Obama administration.
Though the Unha-3 rocket that North Korea used Wednesday did not carry a warhead, it relied on technology similar to that of a long-range missile, leading Washington, Seoul and Tokyo to describe the launch as a de facto missile test that violated U.N. Security Council resolutions.
The North had carried out four previous missile or rocket launches, dating back to 1998. In the most recent one, eight months ago, the rocket broke apart after roughly 90 seconds and dropped into the sea.
The launch Wednesday, whatever the result, appears to be the North’s most capable attempt. The rocket was fired from a facility in the country’s northwestern corner, not far from the Chinese border. It traveled southward, zipping over the water between South Korea and China, flying above the Japanese island of Okinawa, then heading toward the Philippines.
According to the Japanese government, stages of the rocket fell into the Yellow Sea and the East China Sea — the planned trajectory that North Korea had described in its report to the International Maritime Organization, which is responsible for maritime safety.
South Korean President Lee Myung-bak called an emergency security meeting, and a Japanese government spokesman called the launch “unacceptable.”
“It is extremely regrettable that North Korea went through with the launch despite our calls to exercise restraint,” said the spokesman, Osamu Fujimura.
In Washington, “we noted the launch, and we are monitoring the situation. We will have further official comment later,” Reuters quoted a U.S. official as saying in an e-mail message.
Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.), chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, criticized the launch, saying it shows that a defiant Pyongyang “is moving ever closer towards its ultimate goal of producing a nuclear ballistic missile.”
The launch caught North Korea’s Asian neighbors off guard. Though the North had stated earlier this month that it would go ahead, South Korean military officials on Tuesday told reporters in Seoul that Pyongyang was disassembling its rocket to fix technical problems.
The rocket was launched at 9:51 a.m. local time, according to the South Korean government.
For North Korea, an impoverished authoritarian police state, the launch comes at a critical time. The country is days away from the one-year anniversary of the death of leader Kim Jong Il, and some outside analysts called the rocket blast a means to mark the occasion. The launch also comes just eight months after the high-profile failure — one the North had invited foreign journalists to watch.