North Korea test build-up at rocket launch site

North Korea says the launch, set for sometime between April 12 and 16, will
fire a satellite into orbit to study the country’s crops and natural
resources. It is also meant to honor one of the country’s most important
days – the centennial of the April 15 birth of national founder Kim Il Sung.

Washington says North Korea uses such launches to test missile systems for
nuclear weapons that could target the United States. While North Korea has
conducted two nuclear tests, analysts don’t believe it has yet mastered the
technology needed to shrink a nuclear weapon and mount it onto a missile.

Any launch would be the end of a Feb. 29 accord between North Korea and the
United States that would ship U.S. food aid to the impoverished North in
exchange for a moratorium on missile and nuclear tests, as well as a
suspension of nuclear work at its main Yongbyon nuclear facility. The U.S.
says plans to provide food to the North are already on hold.

The launch would be the fourth of its kind since 1998, when Pyongyang sent a
long-range rocket hurtling over Japan. The last rocket launch, in 2009, led
to U.N. condemnation and the North walking away from six-nation nuclear
disarmament talks; weeks later, Pyongyang carried out its second nuclear
test.

The rocket engine test stand (right) and instrumentation site (left) at
North Korea’s Tongchang-ri Launch Facility (AP Photo/DigitalGlobe)

The planned launch could demonstrate if North Korea is closer to perfecting a
multistage rocket that could hit the United States. Analysts fear a new
launch could spur a chain of events that would mirror 2009 and send tensions
soaring again on the Korean peninsula. A year after the last test, 50 South
Koreans were killed in attacks blamed on North Korea.

North Korea’s Tongchang-ri Launch Facility, including the launch pad,
(center left), the rocket engine test stand, (bottom), and the assembly
building, (top in green) (AP Photo/DigitalGlobe)

The new satellite images show what are likely empty fuel and oxidizer tanks in
previously empty, fenced-in areas, the institute’s analysis says.

“The tanks were apparently dumped in these locations after their contents
were transferred to buildings that will directly fuel the first stage of the
Unha-3” rocket, according to the analysis. “The large number of
apparently empty tanks indicates that the transfer process may have been
close to completion.”

The announcement of the latest launch came just two weeks after the U.S.-North
Korean nuclear-freeze-for-aid agreement, which had buoyed hopes for improved
relations between the wartime enemies under new North Korean leader Kim Jong
Un. He came to power after his father Kim Jong Il died of a heart attack in
December.

North Korea’s ruling party announced Monday that it will hold an important
political conference April 11 in Pyongyang. Kim Jong Un is expected to gain
new titles at the conference, which comes shortly before the planned launch.

The North’s new Tongchang-ri rocket launch site is about 35 miles from the
Chinese border city of Dandong. North Korea has said that the southerly
flight path from the site was chosen so debris wouldn’t hurt neighboring
countries.

But there has been widespread fear over falling debris from the rocket.
Japan’s defense minister has ordered missile units to intercept the rocket
if it or its fragments threaten to hit Japan. Seoul has also warned it might
shoot down any parts of the North Korean rocket heading for South Korean
territory.

South Korean defense officials have said the main body of the three-stage
rocket was transported to a building in Tongchang-ri.

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