S. Korea set to announce participation in PSI

(ATTN: UPDATES throughout with U.N.'s provisional compromise against N. Korea)
SEOUL, April 12 (Yonhap) -- South Korea plans to announce its participation in
the U.S.-led anti-proliferation campaign next week, government sources said
Sunday following reports that world powers agreed to a draft U.N. Security
Council statement condemning North Korea's latest rocket launch.

Despite widespread international warnings, North Korea blasted off a long-range
rocket on April 5, which outside experts suspect was a disguised missile test.
The U.S. and its allies have since been pushing for a new resolution by the U.N.
Security Council.
South Korea said the North's provocative rocket launch reminds it of the need for
joining the Proliferation Security Initiative (PSI) designed to interdict the
trade of weapons of mass destruction. North Korea is a main target of the PSI,
which now has 94 member states.
South Korea's former liberal administration rejected the U.S. request for joining
the PSI in a bid not to antagonize the communist neighbor.
But the current conservative government of President Lee Myung-bak took office
last year on a pledge to get tougher on the North as long as it refuses to
denuclearize and continues hostile acts.
"The government is expected to announce its decision to take part in the PSI
shortly after the U.N. Security Council issues a statement on North Korea's
rocket launch," a foreign ministry source said.
North Korea said it would regard the South's participation into the PSI as a
declaration of a war.
At the United Nations, world powers reportedly agreed to get the Security Council
to adopt a "presidential statement" instead of a full-fledged sanctions
resolution against the North's rocket launch.
The "presidential statement" reportedly include strong language denouncing the
North's rocket launch which regional powers claim violated an earlier Security
Council sanctions resolution adopted after the country test-fired a long-range
missile and detonated a nuclear device in 2006.
The U.S. and Japan called for a new U.N. Security Council resolution to punish
the North's latest provocative rocket launch but its veto-wielding allies _ China
and Russia _ maintained a lukewarm stance, reports said.
After days of intensive negotiations, the council's five permanent members and
Japan agreed to a draft of a non-biding presidential statement, according to U.N.
sources. The statement is expected to be issued as early as on Monday.
lcd@yna.co.kr