North Korea ground tested a new type of high-power carrier rocket engine for launching of geostationary satellites Tuesday, but some suspect the North is working on long-range missiles.
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The UN and others view the North’s space launch project as a cover for missile tests, as rockets and ballistic missiles in satellite launches share similar bodies, engines, and other technology. The test explosion, the most powerful to date, was conducted on the 68th anniversary of the founding of North Korea’s government.
Photographs of the front page of today’s Rodong Sinmun newspaper show the supreme leader, Kim Jong Un, beaming as an engine fixed into a scaffold belches orange flames.
Japan’s Defense Minister Tomomi Inada said on Tuesday that “the speed of North Korea’s development” meant it was important to “take all possible measures” to ensure Japan’s defenses were sufficient and to reinforce the Japan-U.
In February, North Korea put a satellite into space with a long-range rocket and has since test-fired dozens of short- and midrange ballistic missiles.
NorthKorea earlier this month fired three missiles that flew about 1,000 km (600 miles) each and in August tested a submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) that global experts said showed considerable progress. Other pictures showed Kim observing the test and laughing.
China and the United States are also targeting the finances of Liaoning Hongxiang Industrial, a Chinese conglomerate headed by a Communist Party cadre, that the Obama administration thinks has a role in assisting North Korea’s nuclear program, the Wall Street Journal reported on Monday.
The company, which is based on the North Korean border in Liaoning province’s Dandong city, exported around $171 million worth of goods to the North between 2011 and 2015, the report said, adding its imports from the country totalled more than $360 million during the same period.
Professor Yang Moo-Jin of the University of North Korean Studies said the North had set a five-year space development program that ends this year.
AFTER issuing contrasting responses to North Korea’s fifth nuclear test two weeks ago, the United States and China – the world’s largest and second largest economies respectively – vowed Monday to coordinate more closely on addressing the nuclear threat posed by the reclusive regime.
“This new test heralds an upcoming landmark ICBM test”.
Pyongyang is also working to develop nuclear-armed missiles with ranges that could strike the USA mainland.
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North Korea’s dictator, Kim Jong-un, is one of the most risky persons in the world without a doubt, next to Russia’s Vladimir Putin, although I think Putin is a very smart man with sinister motives. But USFK Commander Gen. Vincent K. Brooks urged the US last week to step up its actions in the violatile region.
