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Influential sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un again on Sunday vowed to push for a second attempt to launch a spy satellite as he criticized a UN Security Council meeting over the North’s failed first launch.
The North’s attempt to put its first military spy satellite into orbit failed last Wednesday as its rocket crashed off the west coast of the Korean peninsula. An emergency meeting of the UN Security Council was still convened at the request of the US, Japan and other countries to discuss the launch as it violated council resolutions banning the North from any launch using ballistic technology. Was.
On Sunday, Kim Yo Jong, Kim’s sister and senior ruling party official, called the UN Council a “political appendage” of the United States, saying its recent meeting was convened after a “gangster-like request” from the US. Was.
She accused the UN Council of being “discriminatory and uncivilized” because it only takes up the issue of the North’s satellite launches while thousands of satellites launched by other countries are already operating in space. He said his country’s effort to acquire a spy satellite is a legitimate step in responding to military threats by the US and its allies.
“(North Korea) will continue to take proactive steps to exercise all legitimate rights of a sovereign state, including a military reconnaissance satellite launch,” Kim Yo Jong said in a statement carried by state media.
In her earlier statement on Friday, Kim Yo Jong said the North’s spy satellite would be “correctly placed into space orbit in the near future” but did not say when its second launch attempt would take place.
South Korea’s spy agency told lawmakers on Wednesday that it could take “more than several weeks” for North Korea to know what caused the failed launch, but that it may attempt a second launch sooner if the faults are not serious.
A military surveillance satellite is among a list of sophisticated weapons systems Kim Jong Un has vowed to acquire amid longstanding security tensions with the United States. Since the beginning of 2022, Kim has conducted more than 100 missile tests in what he called a warning over expanded military exercises between the US and South Korea.
Experts say that Kim would like to use his modern weapons stockpile to get concessions washington and its partners in future diplomacy.
North Korea has been subject to several UN sanctions over its past nuclear and missile tests and satellite launches. But the UN Security Council has failed to toughen those sanctions over North Korea’s recent test activities as permanent members of the UN Council China and Russia blocked efforts by the US and others to do so. During the latest session of the UN Council on Friday, China and Russia again clashed with the US over the North’s failed launch.
After repeated failures, North Korea put Earth-observation satellites into orbit in 2012 and 2016, but foreign experts say there is no evidence that either satellite transmitted imagery and other data .