| This photo, provided by North Korea's Korean Central News Agency, shows the launch of the North's new 'Chollima-1' rocket, allegedly carrying a military reconnaissance satellite, 'Malligyong-1,' from Tongchang-ri on the North's west coast, June 1. Yonhap |
North Korea's claimed space rocket launch ended in failure early Thursday, the South Korean military said, the second such botched attempt following its earlier failure in May.
The assessment by the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) came soon after the North's official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said its second launch of a "military reconnaissance satellite" failed due to an error in the emergency blasting system during the third-stage flight, vowing to conduct another launch in October.
The launch came amid a major South Korea-U.S. military exercise and after a landmark trilateral summit among Seoul, Washington and Tokyo, where their leaders highlighted their commitment to sturdier cooperation against Pyongyang's evolving military threats.
The JCS said that at 3:50 a.m., it detected the launch fired southward from the Tongchang-ri area on the North's west coast and that it had tracked and monitored the rocket immediately after liftoff.
"Our military assesses (the launch) as a failure," the JCS said in a statement, describing the move as a "clear" violation of U.N. Security Council resolutions banning any launch using ballistic missile technology.
President Yoon Suk Yeol ordered the National Security Council to share Seoul's analysis of the failed launch with the United States and Japan, after being briefed on discussions made in an emergency NSC meeting convened after the launch, according to his office.
The United States "strongly" condemned the North's latest launch, calling it a brazen violation" of multiple United Nations Security Council resolutions, according to a statement from the White House National Security Council.
A JCS official told reporters on condition of anonymity that the North's rocket traveled 33 kilometers west of South Korea's northwestern island of Baengnyeong, adding that the military assesses that parts of the rocket have fallen into areas near zones that North Korea notified prior to the launch.
The South Korean military has deployed naval ships and aircraft to conduct a search and salvage operation for fallen parts of the rocket, the official said.
Another JCS official said the South and the U.S. jointly assesses that the launch took place at the North's new launch site in Tongchang-ri, just as the first launch did in May.
The JCS added that while conducting the allies' Ulchi Freedom Shield (UFS) exercise in a "high-intensity" manner, the South Korean military will maintain a "firm" readiness posture based on capabilities to respond "overwhelmingly" to any North Korean provocations.
| South Korean military reveals a sunken part of North Korea's ill-fated Chollima-1 rocket at the Navy's 2nd Fleet Command in Pyeongtaek on South Korea's west coast, June 16. Yonhap |
According to the North's state media, the flights of the rocket's first and second stages were "normal, but the error occurred in the later stage flight.
"The NADA said that it would make clear in a short span of time the reason why the emergency blasting system was operated abnormally," the KCNA said, referring to the North's National Aerospace Development Administration by its acronym.
One of the JCS officials said the military cannot rule out the possibility that the North will make its third launch attempt on the occasion of the founding of the North's ruling Workers' Party on Oct. 10, noting that the latest launch took place before its state founding anniversary on Sept. 9.
In the lead-up to the launch, the North reportedly informed Japan of a plan to launch a satellite and designate three maritime danger zones ― one west of the Korean Peninsula, the second in the East China Sea and the third to the east of the Philippine island of Luzon ― between Thursday and Aug. 31.
The launch window overlaps the annual UFS exercise that kicked off Monday and is set to end Aug. 31. The North has long denounced the allies' joint military drills as a rehearsal for an invasion.
Pyongyang launched its first military spy satellite, the Malligyong-1, mounted on a new type of rocket named the Chollima-1, on May 31. But the rocket crashed into the Yellow Sea after an "abnormal starting" of the second-stage engine.
The South retrieved parts of the North Korean satellite wreckage from the botched launch on May 31 and concluded that it had no military value.
The North has been striving to secure a space-based reconnaissance asset as part of key defense projects unveiled at the eighth congress of its ruling party in early 2021.
Observers said the North appears intent on securing intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) assets as it is far behind South Korea and the United States in ISR capabilities despite its focus on developing an array of formidable weapons systems, namely tactical nuclear arms.
The launch also coincided with Pyongyang's expected efforts to liven up the festive mood ahead of the 75th anniversary of the founding of its regime on Sept. 9, the observers said. (Yonhap)