North Korea opens 5-day launch window for rocket

North Korea's five-day window to launch a rocket opened Thursday with Asian countries on alert, as Washington told G8 world powers that the communist state was in flagrant violation of a UN ban.

The communist state has said it will launch the rocket between Thursday and Monday, most likely between 2200 GMT and 0300 GMT, to mark Sunday's centenary of the birth of its founding leader Kim Il-Sung.

His grandson Kim Jong-Un is now in charge of the poor but nuclear-armed country, where food shortages remain endemic, and has cemented his rule with a series of top titles including now chairman of the Central Military Commission.

North Korea says the rocket will place a satellite in orbit for peaceful research purposes, promoting the Kim dynasty's goal for the isolated country to attain the rank of a "powerful and prosperous state" this year.

But Western critics see the launch as a thinly veiled ballistic missile test, banned by United Nations resolutions. The United States has suspended a deal agreed just in February to give food aid for North Korea.

The North says it has installed the satellite payload and fuelled the 30-metre (100-foot) rocket, but officials in South Korea and Japan said there was no sign that liftoff was about to happen on Thursday morning.

"So we believe there is very little possibility of the rocket being launched today, as it said earlier the launch would take place between 7:00 am and noon," a South Korean government official told Yonhap news agency.

Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda said his country was on full alert, while urging North Korea to show "self-restraint until the last minute".

"But we want to be fully prepared for any possible contingency," Noda said, after ordering the deployment of anti-missile batteries on land and at sea to shoot down the rocket if it threatens Japanese territory.

Like Japan, the Philippines ordered flights to divert to avoid being in the Pacific area where debris from the rocket might fall. The UN's maritime agency has also warned shipping to be on alert.

But noon in North Korea came and went with no sign of the launch, as the country prepared mass festivities to mark the anniversary on Sunday with tens of thousands expected to appear in Pyongyang's vast Kim Il-Sung Square.

North Korea says it has invited between 150 and 200 foreign journalists to watch the launch and the commemorations, which is believed to be the largest number of overseas media ever invited to the reclusive state.

A large television screen has been installed at a specially inaugurated international press centre in Pyongyang, apparently to relay live footage of the rocket blasting off.

But there was no sign that a takeoff was imminent, and weather websites showed that conditions were cloudy over the launch site in northwest North Korea's Cholsan peninsula.

At the start of a Group of Eight meeting in Washington, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said the powerful club of industrialised nations was united in wanting stability on the divided Korean peninsula.

"North Korea is readying a long-range ballistic missile launch over the East China Sea. It comes just weeks after North Korea agreed to a moratorium on missile testing," Clinton said, referring to February's food aid deal.

"It violates multiple UN Security Council resolutions," she told fellow G8 foreign ministers.
The G8 includes the United States, Russia and Japan, which comprise half of the nations involved in moribund talks on ending North Korea's nuclear programme.

North Korea is adamant its rocket launch does not amount to a banned intercontinental missile test and says it has every right to send the satellite up, as it promotes the untested leadership of Kim Jong-Un who is in his late 20s.

He was elected chairman of the Central Military Commission -- which controls the 1.2-million-strong military -- at a conference of the ruling communist party on Wednesday, the North's official news agency said overnight.

The announcement came after the Workers' Party of Korea declared Jong-Un its "first secretary", an apparently new title.

His father Kim Jong-Il, who died in December, was declared "eternal" general secretary of the party, the post he had held in his lifetime.

"This means that the North has completed the transfer of party power from the late leader to Kim Jong-Un," professor Yang Moo-Jin of Seoul's University of North Korean Studies said, noting the dynastic symbolism ahead of Sunday.

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Gilles Campion | AFP News/Yahoo News Online | April 12, 2012 | Article Link

Philippines braces for North Korea rocket launch

MANILA, Philippines—The Philippines on Tuesday said it will implement a no-fly zone and advised all sea-faring vessels, including fishermen, from going out to sea in the area where North Korea’s rocket is expected to splash down into the sea.

Airlines and private aircrafts will not be allowed to pass through the no-fly zone 190 nautical miles northeast of Sta. Ana, Cagayan province and 140 nautical miles east of Polilio Island, Quezon province, where the rocket is expected to land.

Ferdinand Tienzo, assistant chief, air traffic control of the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines (CAAP) said the no-fly zone will be implemented from 5 a.m. to 1 p.m. from April 12 to 16.

All affected international flights will take other routes to avoid the rocket’s path, Tienzo said.

Benito Ramos, executive director of the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council, advised ships and fishermen from nearby areas such as Polilio Island and Baler to steer clear of the rocket’s path.

Defense Secretary Voltaire Gazmin told reporters that the defense department is not planning any evacuation “but advised [nearby residents] to avoid the area or seek cover.”

“This is first time we will experience this. We are coordinating with US [because] they have the capability to monitor what kind of debris will fall and where,” Gazmin said.

Gazmin added that, historically “North Korea has not been successful in its previous operations.”

He said that the rocket could stray closer or farther to Luzon from its target path over the Pacific Ocean. “We need to be careful and prepare what needs to be done in order to protect ourselves from the debris,” Gazmin said.

North Korea had announced last March that it is planning a rocket launch sometime between April 12 to 16 to put a satellite into orbit. The rocket will consist of multiple booster stages that will jettison from the main rocket after each stage’s fuel is spent.  The jettisoned stage will then splash down into the sea.

Gazmin said that President Benigno Aquino will try to convince fellow members of the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) to pressure North Korea against continuing the launch and preserve peace and stability in the region.

Foreign secretaries of Asean member nations have echoed the same sentiments during a meeting ahead of the summit itself.

Gazmin however said that “based on historical facts, [North Korea] does not listen to the majority.”

The United States and other countries have expressed alarm and said that the rocket launch is actually a ballistic missile test.

South Korea and Japan have already declared that they will shoot down the rocket if it threatens to enter their territory. The Philippines however has no capability to shoot down the rocket.

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Matikas Santos | INQUIRER.net | April 3, 2012 | Article Link

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Notice To Mariners No. 042-2012  

Notice is hereby given to all mariners and other parties concerned that:

1.Reference: Letter from Gilberto G.B. Asuque, Assistant Secretary for Ocean Concerns, Office of the Undersecretary for Special and Ocean Concerns dated 26 March 2012

2.The Government of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea will launch the “earth observation satellite” Kwangmyongsong-3 on 12 to 16 April 2012 and the coordinates of “falling area” are as follows:

Point A Latitude  15 degs      08 mins      19 secs  North   Longitude  124 degs      46 mins      15 secs  East 
Point B Latitude  15 degs      09 mins      35 secs  North   Longitude  123 degs      45 mins      27 secs  East
Point C Latitude  19 degs      23 mins      08 secs  North   Longitude  124 degs      45 mins      13 secs  East 
Point D Latitude  19 degs      24 mins     32 secs  North    Longitude  123 degs      54 mins      26 secs  East

3.In this connection, all ships/watercrafts transiting the vicinity of the above mentioned area are advised to take necessary precautionary measures.

4.The cooperation of all concerned in effecting widest dissemination of this information is requested.

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Philippine Coast Guard | April 2, 2012 | Notice Link

AFP coordinates with nearby countries on NoKor’s planned missile launch

MANILA, Philippines—The Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) said Monday they are closely coordinating with neighboring countries and international organizations to gather information about North Korea’s planned missile launch.

“We are continuously networking and liaising, [in the] sharing of information with concerned international bodies as to the [flight] path [of the rocket] and other essential information that we can obtain pertaining to the planned rocket launch of North Korea,” Colonel Arnulfo Marcelo Burgos Jr, AFP spokesperson said in a press briefing.

He said the AFP’s defense attache to South Korea was already consulting and coordinating with counterparts from South Korea, the United States (US) and other countries.

North Korea had said that the rocket will be launched to put a satellite into orbit. The rocket will have two stages that will jettison from the main rocket, the first is expected to fall into the international waters between China and South Korea and the second stage is expected to splash down 190 kilometers east of northern Philippines.

Japan and South Korea have warned that they will shoot down the rocket if it threatens their territories, while the US and the United Nations warned that the launch could jeopardize the humanitarian food aid being delivered to the country.

“Our paramount concern is the safety and security of our citizens in this country, we need to get accurate information where the [splash down of the second stage] area will be, which area will be affected, what the flight path will be, our course of action will depend on all of this,” Burgos said.

A jettisoned rocket stage is known to disintegrate as it burns while falling through the atmosphere but Burgos said that “it’s better to be prepared, security is the paramount concern of the Armed Forces of the Philippines.”

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Matikas Santos | INQUIRER.net | March 26, 2012 | Article Link

Philippines asks North Korea to abandon satellite launch plan

MANILA -- The Philippine government on Wednesday joined the international community in calling on North Korea to abandon its plan to launch a satellite using ballistic missile technology.

"We express grave concern over the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea’s (DPRK) announced plan to launch a satellite between April 12 and 16 which we find unacceptable," the Philippines, through the Department of Foreign Affairs, said in a statement. 

Pyongyang has announced the plan to launch a rocket carrying a satellite to mark the centenary of the birth of DPRK founder Kim Il-Sung.

The plan comes a few months after Kim Jong-Il's death in December 2011 caused his son Kim Jong-Un to succeed him as North Korea's supreme leader. 

The United Nations Security Council (UNSC) has issued Resolution 1874 (2009) making the same explicit demand of North Korea regarding its planned satellite launch. The same resolution, together with UNSC Resolution 1718 (2006), also said DPRK must suspend all activities related to its ballistic missile program. 

"We strongly urge the DPRK not to proceed with its planned launch and abide by these resolutions, which call for the abandonment of its ballistic missile program in a complete, verifiable and irreversible manner," the Philippine statement read.  

United States President Barack Obama is scheduled to visit the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) in South Korea in an attempt to pressure North Korea from continuing with its plan. Obama will be in Seoul for a  nuclear summit that also includes China, North Korea's ally. 

Last month, North Korea reached an agreement with the US to stop all nuclear tests, uranium enrichment, and long-range missile launches in exchange for food aid.

The Philippines asked North Korea to abide by these commitments. Nevertheless, it said "DRPK’s return to confidence-building and engagement with the international community is key to the continued stability and prosperity of the Korean Peninsula and the entire Asia-Pacific region."

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InterAksyon.com | March 21, 2012 | Article Link