North Korea launches spy satellite, Tokyo and Seoul on alert for the safety of the population

North Korea is back in the international spotlight, as Pyongyang launched a spy satellite shortly before 3:00 p.m. (local time in Albania).

The North Korean regime had initially communicated to Japanese authorities that the satellite could be launched between midnight on Wednesday, November 22 and November 30.

But after Pyongyang seems to have changed the plan, authorities in Tokyo have been alerted and asked the residents of the island of Okinawa to enter shelters.

There was also an immediate reaction from South Korea. Official Seoul has threatened to take " necessary measures to protect the lives and safety of the population ," without specifying what they would be.

The North's launch of a spy satellite points to a race between the two Koreas as the South also prepares to launch its first entirely domestically developed satellite into orbit.

The launch of the satellite from Seoul is scheduled for November 30, on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California.

For years, the UN Security Council has included satellite launches on the list of prohibited activities for North Korea, because it considers them a cover for intercontinental missile tests.

Pyongyang has already tried twice to put a spy satellite into orbit, but the attempts have failed. The first failure dates back to May 31 of this year, when the new Chollima-1 rocket that was supposed to carry the Malligyong-1 satellite into orbit crashed into the Yellow Sea. On August 24, the second phase failed, with the "brothers" from the South finding the wreckage of the satellite.

Pyongyang's launch of a satellite comes two months after Kim Jong Un's visit to Russia, where Putin hosted him at the Vostochny Cosmodrome and promised to help North Korea realize its dream of becoming a space power with satellites in orbit.

" That's why we came here, as the leader of North Korea is very interested in missile technology ," the head of the Kremlin said.

So, Washington and Seoul suspect that "Marshall" and "Czar" agreed to a trade: North Korean ammunition for Russian artillery deployed in Ukraine in exchange for space technology. (A2 Televizion)