Seoul calls NSC meeting ahead of imminent launch

(ATTN: UPDATES with additional information)
By Byun Duk-kun
SEOUL, April 5 (Yonhap) -- South Korea's presidential office convened a National
Security Council (NSC) meeting Sunday amid signs that North Korea will soon
launch what it claims is a satellite, officials said.
The meeting partly confirmed that the launch was imminent, as the presidential
office earlier said the NSC would be convened only after an actual launch.
"An emergency NSC meeting has been called to begin at 11 a.m.," an official at
the presidential office Cheong Wa Dae said.
North Korea has said it will launch the satellite between 11 a.m. and 4 p.m.
during the Saturday-Wednesday period.
South Korea and its allies believe the launch will be a disguise for a test of
the North's long-range Taepodong-2 ballistic missile.
Seoul had expected the launch to take place Saturday after the North's Korean
Central News Agency reported it would take place "soon." Officials here believe
strong winds near the North's launch site in the east coast may have prevented
the launch.
The North's Korean Central Broadcasting Station said the "skies will be clear"
throughout North Korea Sunday.
The NSC meeting, the first to be held since July when a South Korean tourist was
shot to death in the North's Mount Kumgang resort, will mainly discuss Seoul's
response to the launch that could include joining the U.S.-led Proliferation
Security Initiative, according to officials.
The two Koreas have remained divided since the end of the Korean War and are
technically still at war as the 1950-53 conflict ended only with an armistice,
not a peace treaty.
bdk@yna.co.kr
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