World pressures N. Korea to drop rocket launch plan

The international community has mounted pressure on North Korea to drop its plan to launch a satellite next month to celebrate the 100th year since the birth of late founder Kim Il-sung.

Not only the U.S., but North Korea’s major ally China and other regional powers including Japan and Russia have raised concerns over Pyongyang’s announcement of the plan, saying it breaches a U.N. Security Council resolution. The U.N. Security Council Resolution 1874, adopted after the North had a second nuclear test in 2009, bans North Korea from launching any nuclear or ballistic missile.

In response, the North said on Sunday it has the right to launch the Kwangmyongsong-3, denouncing the international pressure.

“It is a typical expression of anti-North Korean policy, denying our rights to the peaceful use of space, and a nasty act to violate our autonomy,” the North’s state-run Korea Central News Agency said in a commentary.

“Launching a satellite for the purpose of scientific research and economic development is not an exclusive right of a certain country.”

Over the weekend, the U.S. warned that it would not send food aid to the impoverished communist state if the North goes ahead with its satellite-launching plan in April.

“We made clear unequivocally that we considered that any satellite launch would be a deal-breaker,” U.S. State Department spokesperson Victoria Nuland said.

The two countries had agreed in late February that the U.S. would give 240,000 tons of nutritional assistance to the North on the condition that Pyongyang puts a moratorium on long-range missile tests and nuclear facilities.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon urged the North to reconsider the plan.

Japan strongly warned that it would intercept the North Korean rocket should it fly towards Japan, the country’s Yomiuri Shinbun reported Saturday quoting Japanese government officials. The news report said the Japanese government is reviewing issuing a shootdown order to the Self-Defense Forces based on the national self-defense law.

China, the key supporter of food and energy for the North, also raised concern on the North’s rocket-launch plan, saying it hopes all parties remain calm, exercise restraint and avoid escalating tensions on the Korean peninsula.

The Russian foreign ministry also said the North plan provokes “serious concern,” urging Pyongyang not to breach the U.N. Security Council resolution.

A senior Korean government official said Seoul will “calmly but quickly” respond to the North’s decision and put every diplomatic effort to make Pyongyang withdraw its rocket-launching decision.

By Kim Yoon-mi and news reports
(yoonmi@heraldcorp.com)