Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida announced on Tuesday August 22 that his government had been informed by North Korea of ??the launch of a satellite in the coming days. Meanwhile, the Japanese Coast Guard issued an alert for a “satellite rocket launch” between August 24 and August 31 for three danger areas, in the Yellow Sea, East China Sea and waters east of China. Luzon Island in the Philippines.
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has made the development of a military spy satellite a priority to “address the dangerous military actions of the United States and its vassals”. But a first attempt to launch it at the end of May ended in failure. The United States and South Korea, which are currently conducting major joint military maneuvers, suspect Pyongyang of developing a new intercontinental ballistic missile, which includes technologies similar to that of a satellite launcher.
“North Korea’s so-called satellite launch is in flagrant violation of UN Security Council resolutions banning it from developing ballistic missiles,” South Korea’s ministry of security said in a statement on Tuesday. Unification, in charge of North Korean affairs. “No matter what excuses North Korea tries to make, it cannot justify this illegal act,” he added.
Tokyo calls “to cancel this launch”
The Japanese Prime Minister, for his part, at a press conference, called on Pyongyang “to cancel this launch”, and ordered his government to take “all possible measures to prepare for any unforeseen eventuality”.
South Korean intelligence had told parliament last week that North Korea may try again to launch a satellite before the regime’s 75th founding anniversary on September 9.
On May 31, a rocket presented by Pyongyang as being the launcher of a military observation satellite crashed into the Yellow Sea shortly after takeoff, not without having triggered air alerts in South Korea and in the Japanese archipelago. from Okinawa. North Korea had cited a technical problem, which the central committee of the ruling Workers’ Party later “harshly criticized” those responsible for.
The South Korean army, after a complex 36-day operation at sea, had finally recovered parts of the rocket and the satellite. After review by South Korean and American experts, the South Korean Ministry of Defense had determined that the satellite had “no military utility”.
The possibility of “a thermonuclear war”, according to the official North Korean agency
Pyongyang’s new launch announcement coincides with “Ulchi Freedom Shield”, the name given to the large-scale US-South Korean maneuvers that started on Monday and are due to run until August 31. According to the three allies, these exercises aim to respond to the growing threats from North Korea, which has nuclear weapons.
North Korea’s official news agency (KCNA) on Tuesday condemned the “aggressive nature” of the military drills in an editorial. If the drills involve “nuclear provocation,” the possibility “of thermonuclear war on the Korean Peninsula will become more realistic,” she warned.
Pyongyang, which believes that these joint exercises are actually preparing for an invasion of the North or the overthrow of its regime, has repeatedly warned that “crushing” actions will respond to them. Computer attacks attributed to North Korean hackers have already targeted South Korean companies working for the two armies in recent days.
Last week, US President Joe Biden received his South Korean counterpart Yoon Suk-yeol and Japanese Prime Minister Kishida at Camp David. It was the first time the leaders of the three countries had met for a stand-alone summit. They had announced a program of joint military exercises over several years and the establishment of a high-level emergency communication channel, a sort of three-handset “red telephone” to guard against the threat from North America. Korean.
