Summary:
- North Korea's second attempt to launch a military spy satellite fails.
- The rocket experienced problems during its third stage.
- South Korea's military confirms the launch's failure.
- North Korea plans to attempt another launch in October.
- Global concerns rise over North Korea's missile and nuclear threats.
- Calls for diplomatic engagement amid tensions.
Japan's Okinawa woke to a loud siren early Thursday morning just before 4 a.m. local time warning them to take cover indoors from a rocket North Korea had launched minutes ago. But that launch ended up as the second failure by Pyongyang to put a military spy satellite in space. North Korea said the rocket booster experienced a problem during its third stage before it could reach orbit. South Korea's military said it tracked the flight from its launch at the North Sohae satellite launching ground and also concluded it was a failure. Thursday was the North's second failure in three months.
Its Cholima-1 rocket launch on May 31 met with a similar fate, with the booster and payload plunging into the sea off South Korea's west coast. However, the North's space agency vowed on Thursday to try to launch the satellite again in October. The nuclear-armed country wants to place what would be its first military intelligence satellite into orbit, saying it eventually plans for a fleet of satellites to monitor moves by U.S. and South Korean troops. Thursday's failure comes less than a week after U.S. President Joe Biden met the leaders of South Korea and Japan Camp David, the presidential retreat, where they agreed to look into conducting joint military exercises to tackle challenges that include North Korea's nuclear and missile threats. And on Monday, the U.S. and South Korea kicked off a 10-day joint military drill known as Uchi Freedom Shield, which the North called a rehearsal for nuclear war. South Korea's foreign minister Park Jin and his U.S. and Japan counterparts on Thursday strongly condemned North Korea's rocket launch, which they said was a ballistic missile designed as a space rocket.
The South's foreign ministry said that the ministers agreed during a phone call to consider unilateral sanctions in response to Thursday's launch. Washington and Seoul have called Pyongyang's satellite launch a violation of the United Nations Security Council resolutions that banned North Korea from testing any technology that could be used to build ballistic missiles. The United States is urging Pyongyang to refrain from further threatening activity and called on its officials to engage in serious diplomacy.