Pyongyang announces February 8-25 window for launch

Pyongyang has announced it will launch a satellite-bearing rocket sometime between February 8-25, which is around the time of the birthday on Feb 16 of late leader Kim Jong-Il, father of current leader Kim Jong-Un.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Lu Kang said bilateral relations had been discussed among other issues.

The North Korean government says it has a sovereign right to pursue a space program but the USA and other world powers fear the launch would be an attempt by Pyongyang to covertly advance its long-range ballistic missile program, a move that would violate United Nations resolutions.

The rocket launch declaration was made about a month after the DPRK’s claim on January 6 that it had tested its first H-bomb, the fourth in total of its nuclear detonations.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said the North Korean announcement “will further aggravate the profound concerns that the global community already has in the wake of the recent nuclear test”, a spokesman said.

Chinese cooperation is key to putting together and implementing any meaningful sanctions resolution, as it is one of the five veto-holding permanent members of the U.N. Security Council and the main provider of food and fuel for the impoverished North.

Jin said China would like to try additional steps before tough sanctions are imposed, mainly using inducements to persuade the North to return to six-nation nuclear disarmament talks hosted by Beijing that have been stalled since 2009.

Earlier in the day, the defence ministry in Seoul said it had issued orders to destroy any missile that might stray over South Korean territory.

Japan has put its military on alert to shoot down any rocket that threatens its territory.

North Korea has spent decades trying to develop operational nuclear weapons along with missiles capable of striking the mainland United States.

These balloons, apart from used toilet paper, also contain cigarette butts and propaganda leaflets denouncing the US and South Korean leader Park Geun-hye, calling her “political filth”, according to this report in Korea JoongAng Daily.