N. Korea marks month since 'satellite' launch

SEOUL, May 7 (Yonhap) -- North Korea on Thursday reiterated its claim to a
successful satellite launch, marking a month of its purported "normal operation"
in orbit.
Pyongyang insists its April 5 rocket launch orbited a communications satellite,
Kwangmyongsong-2, while outside monitors say no such object has entered space.
South Korea, the United States and Japan condemned the launch as a disguised
long-range missile test. The U.N. Security Council has since blacklisted three
North Korean firms suspected of aiding the country's nuclear and missile
activities.
"The observation by the satellite and a control test were normally conducted," a
spokesman for the Korean Committee of Space Technology, which orchestrated the
launch, said in a statement.
On the day it launched the rocket, North Korean media said the Kwangmyongsong-2
satellite was broadcasting songs praising North Korea's late founder, Kim
Il-sung, and his son and current leader Kim Jong-il at a frequency of 470 MHz.
The unidentified spokesman repeated the claim Thursday.
"The melodies of 'Song of General Kim Il-sung' and 'Song of General Kim Jong-il'
sent to the earth at 470 MHz already made public and the observation of
information about the satellite and the operation of which measuring devices as
the radar for tracking orbit on the ground confirmed that the satellite was
accurately put into orbit," he said in the statement carried by the official
Korean Central News Agency.
Following the launch, the International Telecommunication Union, a U.N. agency in
charge of radio frequency allocation for satellites, dismissed North Korea's
claim and said it has no information about a North Korean satellite in orbit.
North Korea withdrew from nuclear disarmament talks and warned of a second
nuclear test in protest of the U.N. Security Council's punishment for the launch.
hkim@yna.co.kr
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