Warns Moves To Intercept Rocket Will Be Met With Counterstrike

Once again asserting its plans to launch a satellite within days, on Monday the government of North Korea warned the United States, Japan and South Korea that any attempt to intercept the rocket would be met by a counterstrike.

"We will retaliate (over) any act of intercepting our satellite for peaceful purposes with prompt counterstrikes by the most powerful military means," the state-run Korean Central News Agency quoted a military spokesman as saying, reports Breitbart.

As ANN reported last week, US intelligence based on spy satellite photos suggests North Korea is preparing another test of its long-range Taepodong-2 missile. The Communist state responds the impending launch aims to put a communications satellite into orbit... and threatened "a just retaliatory strike operation not only against all the interceptor means involved but against the strongholds" if the rocket is shot down.

"Shooting our satellite for peaceful purposes will precisely mean a war," the North Korean government added.

The latest missive from the Democratic People's Republic of Korea comes days after the regime of Kim Jong-il said "security cannot be guaranteed for South Korean civil airplanes" during a planned joint US-South Korean military exercise along the demilitarized zone, which also began Monday.

In a rare move, the KPA's Supreme Command also issued a statement Monday... saying North Korean soldiers have been ordered to be "fully combat-ready" during the exercise, and prepared to "deal merciless retaliatory blows" should there be any intrusion "into the sky and land and seas of the DPRK even an inch."

FMI: https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/kn.html