Japan, S. Korea reaffirm stance to take N. Korea launch to UNSC+

THE HAGUE, March 31 Kyodo -
The Japanese and South Korean foreign ministers reaffirmed their consensus in
talks Tuesday that should North Korea go ahead with a rocket launch, the issue
should be taken up at the U.N. Security Council, sources involved in the talks
said.
Japanese Foreign Minister Hirofumi Nakasone, who met with his counterpart Yu
Myung Hwan on the sidelines of a donor conference on Afghanistan in the Hague,
is also scheduled to hold separate talks with U.S. Secretary of State Hillary
Clinton to reconfirm trilateral cooperation in dealing with Pyongyang's
imminent launch.
Japan, over which the North's ''satellite'' rocket will fly if launched as
planned, is stepping up a flurry of diplomacy in hopes of winning support to
seek a resolution for new sanctions or condemnation at the Security Council
against North Korea in the case of a launch.
North Korea has declared it plans to put an experimental communication
satellite into orbit between April 4 and 8, notifying aviation and maritime
organizations in advance in accordance with international norms.
But Japan, South Korea and the United States say the launch would violate a
2006 U.N. Security Council resolution banning North Korea from all activities
related to its ballistic missile program.
Japan and its allies see the planned launch as a disguised test-firing of a
Taepodong-2 long-range ballistic missile because the technology involved in
launching a satellite is the same.
==Kyodo
2009-03-31 22:16:18