NKorea set to risk further wrath

By Alex Jensen

SEOUL

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has overseen another leap in his country’s rocket technology thanks to a "successful" test of a powerful new engine, according to Pyongyang’s state-run media Tuesday.

The development has fed suggestions that the North may launch a long-range rocket in line with the anniversary of its ruling party’s foundation in less than three weeks.

That would inevitably invite even more pressure on the reclusive state, which is still to be punished by the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) for its fifth ever nuclear test this month.

North Korea is barred from nuclear tests and developing ballistic missile technology under numerous UNSC resolutions.

The North’s KCNA news agency reported that the engine test made it possible to launch “various kinds of satellite”.

Kim called for his country’s space agency to speed up its technological advancement, despite currently struggling to repair the damage caused by North Korea's worst flood since being established in the wake of World War II.

Accompanying KCNA images showed a vertical engine test stand built into a hillside at Sohae Satellite Launching Station near the western border with China -- the same site witnessed a North Korean satellite being fired into orbit in February.

Kim’s stated goal for the coming years is to succeed with the launch of multiple geostationary satellites, but onlookers such as South Korea and the United States have long been concerned that the North is more interested in bolstering its inter-continental ballistic missile capabilities.

Pyongyang has already boasted of its capacity to miniaturize a nuclear warhead and thus attack the American mainland, while carrying out regular tests of shorter range projectiles in recent months including submarine-launched ballistic missiles -- although analysts generally feel North Korea's present range is limited to closer targets such as the South and Japan.

A spokesperson for Seoul's Joint Chiefs of Staff said that Pyongyang will have taken another step forward if Tuesday's news is taken on face value.

"Given Pyongyang claims the single engine's thrust reached 80 [ton force], there seems to be an improvement in the engine's propulsion power. We are still analyzing if the test was really successful," the spokesperson was quoted as saying by local news agency Yonhap.