N. Korea envoy warns U.N. against retaliating

A senior North Korean diplomat warned Tuesday that the government will retaliate if the U.N. Security Council takes action over its rocket launch, insisting that his country sent up a peaceful satellite and not a missile.

North Korea’s deputy U.N. ambassador, Pak Tok Hun, accused the Security Council of targeting his country while allowing many other countries to launch satellites.

The United States identified the rocket launched by North Korea on Sunday as a Taepodong 2 that failed to achieve orbit but traveled 1,900 miles before landing in the Pacific Ocean. North Korea claims the rocket shot a satellite into space.

President Obama and other world leaders say the launch violated a 2006 Security Council resolution that barred North Korea from ballistic missile activity after it tested a nuclear weapon. They say the council must deliver a strong response.

The government in Pyongyang said it was exercising its right to peaceful space development.

“Every country has the right, the inalienable right, to use outer space peacefully,” Pak said. “Not a few countries, many countries, they’ve already launched satellites, several hundred times. Does it mean that it is OK for them to launch a satellite, but we are not allowed to do that? This is not fair.”

He said the Security Council has never taken action against another country for launching a satellite, “but we’re not allowed to do that -- that is not democratic.”

North Korea would consider Security Council action an infringement on its sovereignty and respond with “strong steps,” he said.