N. Korea Insists It Launched Satellite, Not a Missile

SEOUL — North Korea on Friday rejected assertions that it test-fired a ballistic missile this week, accusing the U.S. and Japan of making a “fuss” over the launch of a scientific satellite.

According to Japanese defense officials, North Korea test-fired a two-stage ballistic missile Monday that sailed over northern Japan and fell into the Pacific Ocean. The first stage landed in the Sea of Japan. U.S. officials said it showed a worrisome increase in North Korea’s missile capability.

But according to the North’s official Korean Central News Agency, Monday’s launch was of a three-stage, domestically developed rocket that sent a satellite into orbit. The timing and the places where the first two stages of the rockets fell coincide with the American and Japanese reports about what they described as a ballistic missile.

Japanese Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi said he doubted that the rocket carried a satellite.

“If it [a satellite] was launched, I [would] guess Japan’s technology could have already picked it up,” Obuchi said.

In Washington, a State Department official said it was impossible to confirm the North Korean claim that the launch was a scientific satellite.