Kim Jong Un visited the headquarters of the country’s space agency, where he was shown photos taken by Pyongyang’s new military spy satellite that got important sites – State media reported.
North Korea as it is known greeted the successful launch of a military reconnaissance satellite late Tuesday.
North Korea’s official North Korean Central News Agency said the images, which were shown to Kim during a visit to the National Aerospace Technology Administration (NATA) control centre in Pyongyang, were taken between “10:15 a.m. and 10:27 a.m.” on Friday morning.
South Korea’s capital, as well as Mokpo, Gunsan, Pyeongtaek (a major US military base) and Osan (host US military bases), were featured in the images.
The report also claims that the satellite got images of the nuclear-powered aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson, which is currently docked at the Pusan naval base, as well as images of the US military base Pearl Harbor-Hickam in Honolulu.
Earlier in the week, state media reported that the North Korean leader had viewed satellite images of U.S. military facilities, but the images were not made public.
It is noted that it is unclear how advanced the North Korean satellite will be, given the difficulties with camera performance, hard-to-reach components and limited time to take pictures of military targets. In addition, South Korean Defence Minister Shin Won-sik called the North’s reports that Kim had viewed images of Guam “exaggerated,” Yonhap news agency reported.
Even if it enters into normal orbit, it takes a substantial amount of time to conduct normal reconnaissance missions.
On Saturday, top diplomats from Japan, South Korea and the United States strongly condemned the launch of a North Korean spy satellite, which they said used ballistic missile technology banned by UN resolutions.
Conversely, North Korea called the spy satellite programme a “necessary” measure to counter the “space militarization” of the US and its allies and promised to launch additional satellites “in a short time.”
