North Korea has put a military spy satellite into orbit, a challenge to UN resolutions banning it from using ballistic missile technologies, which Tokyo and Washington have sharply condemned.
The rocket which took off Tuesday evening followed the planned trajectory “and managed to put the Malligyong-1 satellite into its orbit”, indicated the official North Korean agency KCNA.
The South Korean military previously announced that it had “detected a supposed military surveillance satellite at 1:43 p.m. GMT.”
The shot was condemned by Tokyo and Washington.
“Even if they call it a satellite, launching an object that uses ballistic missile technology is clearly a violation of United Nations resolutions,” said Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida.
He condemned the operation with “the greatest firmness possible”.
This shooting is “a flagrant violation of multiple resolutions of the United Nations Security Council, increases tensions and risks destabilizing the region and beyond”, also reacted in a press release the spokesperson for the National Security Council of the White House.
“The door to diplomacy is not closed but Pyongyang must immediately stop its provocative actions,” added Adrienne Watson.
South Korea responded by saying it would resume surveillance operations along the border with North Korea that were suspended in 2018 as part of a Seoul-Pyongyang deal aimed at reducing military tensions, a Yonhap News Agency reported.
North Korea had earlier informed Japan of its intention to launch a satellite potentially as early as Wednesday, in a third attempt after two failures to put a military satellite into orbit last May and August.
Likely “countermeasures” from Seoul
This shot, “a few hours before the notification of the time window, seems to underline two things: Pyongyang’s confidence in its success and its intention to maximize the effect of surprise”, reacted for AFP Choi Gi-il, professor of military studies at Sangji University.
Seoul had been warning for weeks that Pyongyang was in the “final stages” of preparing for a new spy satellite launch.
On Monday, the South Korean military warned North Korea to “immediately” stop its preparations, warning Pyongyang that it would take “necessary measures” if necessary.
South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol could thus “suspend the September 19 military agreement,” Yang Moo-jin, president of the University of North Korean Studies in Seoul, told AFP.
This agreement, concluded in 2018 in Pyongyang, aims to reduce military tensions along the highly secure inter-Korean border by creating maritime “buffer zones”.
Tests of medium- or long-range solid-fuel ballistic missiles by Seoul “cannot be ruled out” either, Mr. Yang added.
Seoul plans to launch its first spy satellite using a SpaceX rocket later this month.
This project was criticized as “extremely dangerous military provocations” by Ri Song Jin, a researcher at the National Aerospace Technology Administration, quoted Tuesday by the North’s official news agency, Korean Central News Agency.
Weapons versus space technologies
North Korea’s recent rapprochement with Russia worries the United States and its allies South Korea and Japan.
According to Seoul, Pyongyang supplies weapons to Moscow in exchange for Russian space technology.
At the beginning of November, the American Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, denounced the “growing and dangerous” military ties between Pyongyang and Moscow, following a visit to South Korea.
North Korea has carried out a record number of missile tests this year, despite international sanctions and warnings from the United States, South Korea and their allies.
It also declared its status as a nuclear power “irreversible”.
Last week, it announced that it had successfully conducted ground tests of a “new type” of solid fuel engine for its banned intermediate-range ballistic missiles (IRBMs).
Seoul, Washington and Tokyo have in response strengthened their cooperation. On Tuesday, a U.S. nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, the USS Carl Vinson, arrived at the Busan Naval Base, South Korea.
This is to strengthen the “position of allies in response to nuclear and missile threats from North Korea”, as part of a recent agreement aimed at improving the “regular visibility of American strategic assets”, underlined the South Korean Navy.