Japan puts missile defenses on alert as North Korea warns of satellite launch

TOKYO/SEOUL, May 29 (Reuters) – Japan put its ballistic missile defenses on alert on Monday and vowed to shoot down any missiles threatening its territory after North Korea notified it of a satellite launch between May 31 and 11th of June.

The nuclear-armed North says it has finished its first military spy satellite and leader Kim Jong Un has approved final preparations for launch.

It would be the latest step for North Korea in a series of missile launches and weapons tests in recent months, including a new solid-fueled ICBM.

Japan expects North Korea to fire the rocket carrying its satellite over the southwestern island chain as it did in 2016a Defense Ministry spokesman said.

Analysts say the new satellite is part of a surveillance technology program that includes drones, aimed at improving the ability to strike targets in times of war.

“We will take destructive measures against ballistic and other missiles that are confirmed to land on our territory,” Japan’s Defense Ministry said in a statement.

Japan would use its Standard Missile-3 (SM-3) or Patriot Missile PAC-3 to destroy a North Korean missile, he added.

Any North Korean missile launch would be a serious violation of UN Security Council resolutions condemning its nuclear and missile activity, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida told reporters.

“We strongly urge North Korea to refrain from any launches,” his office said on Twitter, adding that it would cooperate with its US ally South Korea and other countries and do everything possible to collect and analyze information from any launch.

South Korea joined Japan in urging the reclusive North to scrap its planned satellite launch.

“If North Korea goes ahead, it will pay the price and suffer,” a spokesman for the South’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement urging the North to withdraw its “illegal” launch plan.

Kim Gunn, the South’s special envoy for peninsula peace and security affairs, held a tripartite phone call with his counterparts from Japan and the United States, the ministry added.

They agreed to work closely together to lead a united response by the international community to Pyongyang’s planned satellite launch, it said.

North Korea has attempted several times to launch “earth observation” satellites, two of which appear to have been successfully launched into orbit, the latest in 2016.

In May, its leader, Kim, inspected a military satellite facility, the state news agency KCNA said.

In AprilJapan sent a destroyer carrying the SM-3 interceptors that can hit targets in space to the East China Sea, and sent land-based PAC-3 missiles, designed to engage warheads closer to the ground, to the islands of Okinawa. .

“The government recognizes that there is a possibility that the satellite will pass through the territory of our country,” Hirokazu Matsuno, the chief cabinet secretary, told a regular briefing after North Korea informed the Japanese coast guard about the plan.

North Korean state media have criticized plans by rivals Japan, South Korea and the United States to share real-time data on their missile launches, characterizing the three as discussing “sinister measures” to bolster cooperation. military.

Reporting by Hyunsu Yim in Seoul and Nobuhiro Kubo, Elaine Lies, Satoshi Sugiyama and Tim Kelly in Tokyo; Additional reporting by Ju-min Park in Seoul and David Dolan in Tokyo; Edited by Robert Birsel

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