In the latest outburst of vitriol from the Afghan leadership deriding its Western allies, the spokesman for Afghan President Hamid Karzai said the people of Afghanistan “ask NATO to define the purpose and aim of the so-called war on terror”.

“As they question why after a decade, this war in their country has failed to achieve its stated goals, but rather has resulted in the loss of thousands of innocent lives and destruction of their homes”, Aimal Faizi said in a statement.

NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said on Monday he was concerned about the increasingly harsh rhetoric between Karzai and the United States, which contributes the largest contingent to the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan.

He told a news conference in Brussels that “we would also expect acknowledgement from the Afghan side that we have … invested a lot in blood and treasure in helping President Karzai’s country to move forward”.

More than 3,000 foreign troops from 50 countries have been killed in Afghanistan since the U.S.-led military intervention began in 2001. Some estimates put the cost to the United States alone of the Afghan war in the hundreds of billions of dollars.

Speaking to the state news agency, BIA, Faizi said: “The people of Afghanistan ask NATO Secretary-General that while it is clearly known to NATO that terrorism sanctuaries are outside Afghanistan, why this war then continues in their homes and villages unproductively?”

“Therefore, the Afghan people consider this war as aimless and unwise to continue,” he said.

WAR OF WORDS

Karzai marred a debut visit to Afghanistan by the new U.S. defense secretary, Chuck Hagel, last week by accusing Washington and the Taliban of colluding to convince Afghans that foreign forces were needed beyond 2014, when NATO is set to wrap up its combat mission and most foreign troops are to withdraw.

Washington denies the accusation, and found support from Rasmussen who said the allegation was “absolutely ridiculous”.

Karzai’s remarks further strained already fraught ties between the president and the Western allies who are fighting to protect his government from insurgents.

The United States still has 66,000 troops in Afghanistan, down from almost 100,000 two years ago at the height of a surge ordered by President Barack Obama. Washington intends to withdraw most of them by the end of next year but wants to negotiate a continued, smaller presence.

Karzai has been increasingly assertive towards the United States. Last month, he ordered U.S. special forces to leave Wardak province after residents complained that they, and Afghans working with them, were torturing and killing civilians, an allegation denied by the Americans.

Opposition politicians saw Karzai’s order as a political move to bolster his party’s support base ahead of a presidential election next year. Karzai is not allowed to stand again.

“As every day passes, our relations with the international community get worse. Whenever President Karzai makes some remarks against Americans, money goes out of the country and businessmen leave,” Ahmad Zia Massoud, leader of the Afghan National Front opposition alliance, told Reuters.

He said as tension had risen between Washington and Kabul in the past year, and as Afghanistan prepared to go it alone, some $4.5 billion had poured out of the country and into Dubai where worried Afghans are building homes.

(Additional reporting by Mirwais Harooni; Editing by Jon Hemming)

In the latest outburst of vitriol from the Afghan leadership
deriding its Western allies, the spokesman for Afghan President
Hamid Karzai said the people of Afghanistan “ask NATO to define
the purpose and aim of the so-called war on terror”.

“As they question why after a decade, this war in their
country has failed to achieve its stated goals, but rather has
resulted in the loss of thousands of innocent lives and
destruction of their homes”, Aimal Faizi said in a statement.

NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said on Monday
he was concerned about the increasingly harsh rhetoric between
Karzai and the United States, which contributes the largest
contingent to the NATO-led International Security Assistance
Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan.

He told a news conference in Brussels that “we would also
expect acknowledgement from the Afghan side that we have …
invested a lot in blood and treasure in helping President
Karzai’s country to move forward”.

More than 3,000 foreign troops from 50 countries have been
killed in Afghanistan since the U.S.-led military intervention
began in 2001. Some estimates put the cost to the United States
alone of the Afghan war in the hundreds of billions of dollars.

Speaking to the state news agency, BIA, Faizi said: “The
people of Afghanistan ask NATO Secretary-General that while it
is clearly known to NATO that terrorism sanctuaries are outside
Afghanistan, why this war then continues in their homes and
villages unproductively?”

“Therefore, the Afghan people consider this war as aimless
and unwise to continue,” he said.

WAR OF WORDS

Karzai marred a debut visit to Afghanistan by the new U.S.
defence secretary, Chuck Hagel, last week by accusing Washington
and the Taliban of colluding to convince Afghans that foreign
forces were needed beyond 2014, when NATO is set to wrap up its
combat mission and most foreign troops are to withdraw.

Washington denies the accusation, and found support from
Rasmussen who said the allegation was “absolutely ridiculous”.

Karzai’s remarks further strained already fraught ties
between the president and the Western allies who are fighting to
protect his government from insurgents.

The United States still has 66,000 troops in Afghanistan,
down from almost 100,000 two years ago at the height of a surge
ordered by President Barack Obama. Washington intends to
withdraw most of them by the end of next year but wants to
negotiate a continued, smaller presence.

Karzai has been increasingly assertive towards the United
States. Last month, he ordered U.S. special forces to leave
Wardak province after residents complained that they, and
Afghans working with them, were torturing and killing civilians,
an allegation denied by the Americans.

Opposition politicians saw Karzai’s order as a political
move to bolster his party’s support base ahead of a presidential
election next year. Karzai is not allowed to stand again.

“As every day passes, our relations with the international
community get worse. Whenever President Karzai makes some
remarks against Americans, money goes out of the country and
businessmen leave,” Ahmad Zia Massoud, leader of the Afghan
National Front opposition alliance, told Reuters.

He said as tension had risen between Washington and Kabul in
the past year, and as Afghanistan prepared to go it alone, some
$4.5 billion had poured out of the country and into Dubai where
worried Afghans are building homes.

(Additional reporting by Mirwais Harooni; Editing by Jon
Hemming)

“President Karzai is repeating the same mistake and he thinks that Taliban will show him mercy because of his ethnicity,” Ahmad Zia Massoud, leader of the Afghan National Front opposition alliance, told Reuters.

“But Taliban has already announced that the way the president is going, he will end in Ariana Square.”

The former president, Mohammad Najibullah, oversaw the withdrawal of occupying Soviet forces in 1989 before he himself was overthrown by the mujahideen opposition guerrillas.

In 1996, when the Taliban took Kabul, Najibullah was dragged behind a truck and publicly hanged in Ariana Square.

Like Najibullah, Karzai is an ethnic Pashtun, as are most of the Taliban, who were toppled in 2001 after the September 11 attacks on the United States.

Karzai has reached out to the Taliban, whom he calls brothers, trying to lure them to the negotiating table by offering them a role in politics as the country prepares for the withdrawal of foreign combat troops by the end of next year.

A presidential election is also due next year and a parliamentary poll the following year.

Exploratory talks between the United States and the Taliban began clandestinely in Germany in late 2010, but the insurgents abandoned the process last March, blaming “shaky, erratic and vague” U.S. statements.

Afghan government officials have failed in efforts to secure direct talks with the Taliban. The insurgents refuse to discuss reconciliation with Karzai, calling him a “stooge of the invaders”.

Massoud, an ethnic Tajik and a former vice-president, said the Taliban had no intention of brokering peace and would be emboldened to boost their insurgency as foreign troops withdraw.

He said the Taliban’s fighting ability was helped by their trade in drugs and extortion which raised $400 million annually.

“We are at a threshold of collapse … there is no sign of political stability and security in Afghanistan after 2014,” he said, calling on the president to resign and the appointment of an interim government to oversee an early election.

“BAD YEAR”

Government officials fear the militants will infiltrate the capital from hideouts, some only 40 minutes drive away, as the warm-weather fighting season gets underway as the snow melts on mountain passes.

Last week, intelligence officials defused an eight-tonne truck bomb in Kabul.

“The Taliban as an enemy are just next to us … this year will be a very bad year,” Massoud said.

Massoud is the younger brother of the late Ahmad Shah Massoud, a hero of the war against Soviet forces in the 1980s, and leader of the Northern Alliance, which fought the Taliban in the 1990s. He was assassinated days before the September 11 attacks.

Karzai has become increasingly vitriolic against the United States, even accusing Washington of colluding with the Taliban.

The United States denies Karzai’s assertion. Massoud warned that the president’s accusations were eroding the relationship.

“As every day passes, our relations with the international community get worse. Whenever President Karzai makes some remarks against Americans, money goes out of the county and businessmen leave,” said Massoud.

He said as tension had risen between Washington and Kabul in the past year, and as Afghanistan prepared to go it alone, some $4.5 billion had poured out of the country and into Dubai where worried Afghans are building homes.

He said his coalition of ethnic Tajik, Hazara, Uzbek and Pashtun groups would hold a series of meetings very soon to choose a presidential candidate, and he did not rule being a contender.

(Editing by Robert Birsel)

From the only Catholic church in Afghanistan, a country seen as the front line in the fight against Islamist militancy, the 75-year-old Italian priest is closely following the conclave at the Vatican to choose the leader of the Catholic Church.

Even war cannot stop television stations beaming live coverage of news from the Vatican.

As long as you have a satellite dish, you can take your pick of the Vatican Channel, Italy’s Rai Uno or Al Jazeera among dozens of others following the ins and outs of the election.

Moretti, who carries shrapnel wounds from a bomb attack sustained during the Afghan civil war about two decades ago, has his own favorite: Angelo Scola, the archbishop of Milan and one of the main contenders to win the papacy.

“Of course, as an Italian, I would like an Italian. And Scola has a very deep connection with Islamic people,” he said, adding he hoped the next Pope would also take a close interest in the developing world and alleviating poverty.

Scola, 71, knows Islam as head of a foundation to promote Muslim-Christian understanding.

Moretti, who was born in the Italian province of Le Marche, confidently predicts white smoke signaling a winner will puff from the chimney of the Sistine Chapel before Sunday.

The Italian, who wears the symbols of a bishop including a ring and pectoral cross after his appointment by Pope John Paul II as head of the Catholic Church in Afghanistan, is the only priest in a country which is more than 99 percent Muslim.

Moretti, along with about a dozen Catholic nuns, is acutely aware of the conditions of his posting: no proselytizing. Under shariah law, conversion to Christianity is punishable by death.

“We work in silence,” he said from his office, which he calls the Little Vatican, decorated with a blend of Afghan art and pictures of Popes and other Catholic icons.

Only foreigners attend daily Mass. These days up to 60 people from generals and diplomats to aid workers congregate in the catacomb-like chapel which is housed inside the grounds of the Italian embassy.

Moretti has lived in the country on-and-off since 1977, and has seen it go from peace to the Soviet occupation, civil war and more than 11 years of the latest war.

“I experienced the civil war … every day and night it was boom, boom. But I prefer that time to this time.

“Now, it’s suicide attacks, checkpoints and giant cement walls. I don’t recognize the country anymore. It’s very, very sad.”

(Editing by Robert Birsel)

Speaking ahead of a global nuclear security summit in Seoul, Obama held out the prospect of new reductions in the U.S. arsenal as he sought to rally world leaders for additional concrete steps against the threat of nuclear terrorism.

“We can already say with confidence that we have more nuclear weapons than we need,” Obama told students at South Korea’s Hankuk University.

He pledged a new arms-control push with incoming Russian president Vladimir Putin when they meet in May. But any further reductions would face stiff election-year opposition from Republicans in Congress who already accuse him of weakening America’s nuclear deterrent.

Obama laid out his latest strategy against the backdrop of continued nuclear defiance from North Korea and Iran, twin challenges that have clouded his overall nuclear agenda as well as the summit getting under way in Seoul.

Obama set expectations high in a 2009 speech in Prague when he declared it was time to seek “a world without nuclear weapons”. He acknowledged at the time it was a long-term goal, but his high-flown oratory helped him win the Nobel Peace Prize.

In Seoul on Monday, Obama made clear that he remained committed to that notion and insisted that “those who deride our vision, who say that ours is an impossible goal that will be forever out of reach”, were wrong.

Though Obama was vague on exactly how such a vision would be achieved, he voiced confidence the United States and Russia, which reached a landmark arms-control treaty in 2009, “can continue to make progress and reduce our nuclear stockpiles”.

“I firmly believe that we can ensure the security of the United States and our allies, maintain a strong deterrent against any threat, and still pursue further reductions in our nuclear arsenal,” he said.

But another arms accord with Moscow will be a tough sell to U.S. conservatives who say Obama has not moved fast enough to modernize the U.S. strategic arsenal, a pledge he made in return for Republican votes that helped ratify the START treaty.

The United States and Russia are the two biggest nuclear powers, possessing thousands of warheads between them, arsenals that arms-control advocates say are capable of destroying the world several times over.

With U.S. officials privately expressing concern about China’s opaqueness over its growing nuclear weapons program, Obama said he had urged the rising Asian power “to join us in a dialogue on nuclear issues, and that offer remains open”.

NORTH KOREA, IRAN

Obama also used his speech to call on North Korea, which plans a long-range rocket launch next month, to curb its nuclear ambitions or else face further international isolation.

“And know this – there will be no more rewards for provocations. Those days are over. This is the choice before you,” he said, directing his comments at North Korea’s leadership.

South Korean President Lee Myung-bak urged his Chinese counterpart, Hu Jintao, in a meeting on the sidelines of the summit to try to persuade the North to cancel the launch, which Pyongyang says is merely to send a satellite into space.

Seoul and Washington say the launch is a disguised ballistic missile test. The flightpath from a west coast launch pad will take the rocket south towards the Philippines. Two previous launches of the long-range missile have failed.

A defense ministry official in Seoul said South Korea was drawing up a plan to shoot the rocket down if it travels into South Korean territory, the local Yonhap news agency reported.

On Sunday, Obama appealed to China, North Korea’s only major ally, to use its influence with Pyongyang to rein in its nuclear program.

Obama accused Iran of having taken the “path of denial, deceit and deception” in the past but said there was still time for a diplomatic solution and that Tehran had to act with a “sense of urgency”.

“Time is short,” Obama said, referring to the prospects of renewed negotiations between Iran and world powers. “Iran’s leaders must understand that there is no escaping the choice before it.”

Tehran says its nuclear program is purely peaceful, but Israel and Western nations believe it is moving towards a nuclear bomb that could change the regional balance of power.

Obama has urged Israel to hold off on any pre-emptive strikes on Iran’s nuclear sites to give sanctions and diplomacy more time to work.

GENTLE APPROACH

Obama came into office in 2008 declaring nuclear disarmament policy a major theme of his presidency, but momentum has slowed with the approach of the 2012 presidential election

He unveiled a revamped policy in 2010 renouncing development of new nuclear weapons and restricting use of those already in Washington’s arsenal. He followed that up by signing the START treaty with Russia.

Obama secured commitments from world leaders at the inaugural 2010 Nuclear Security Summit in Washington to help keep bomb-grade material out of terrorists’ hands, and independent experts say most of the pledges are being met — though many were modest in scope.

He hopes to build on that in Seoul but is also likely to take a gentle approach with U.S. partners like Pakistan, whose nuclear materials are considered among the biggest areas of risk because of the internal security threat posed by militants.

Underscoring a U.S. sense of caution, defense and national security officials have spent months debating a secret set of new options being prepared for Obama to help guide future arms-control talks. Ideas range from maintaining the status quo to reducing warheads by up to 80 percent, an official has said.

But the administration appears reluctant to push publicly on such a divisive issue as his re-election campaign gathers pace.

(Additional reporting by Yoo Choonsik and Jack Kim; Editing by Nick Macfie)

The North has planned a series of events next month to mark the centenary of the birth of the state’s founder, Kim Il-sung, including a rare ruling party conference and the controversial launch of a ballistic rocket it says will carry a satellite.

Experts say the young Kim, believed to be in his mid to late 20s, could be given two of the countries’ senior most titles during the celebrations — secretary general of the party and chairman of the defense commission.

The North’s state media said on Saturday the Supreme People’s Assembly, which has the formal mandate to appoint the chief of the National Defence Commission, the state’s supreme military body, would meet on April 13.

The Workers’ Party conference is also scheduled for the middle of next month.

The young Kim’s appointment to the top posts would cement his position as paramount leader and ease lingering fears of a power struggle plunging the country into turmoil.

Kim took power after his father died in December and many analysts had feared a chaotic succession.

The young Kim only holds a military post in the ruling party. His father was chief commander of the 1.2 million-strong armed forces and general secretary of the ruling Workers’ Party of Korea.

ROCKET LAUNCH WARNING

The United States has warned that the North’s rocket launch next month will impact an area between Australia, Indonesia and the Philippines, an Australian newspaper reported on Saturday.

The Sydney Morning Herald said that U.S. envoy Kurt Campbell on Friday briefed Australia’s Foreign Minister Bob Carr on the ballistic missile’s southward trajectory from a North Korean launch pad.

“If the missile test proceeds as North Korea has indicated, our judgment is that it will impact in an area roughly between Australia, Indonesia and the Philippines,” the paper quoted Campbell, the assistant secretary of state for East Asia and the Pacific, as saying.

“We have never seen this trajectory before. We have weighed into each of these countries and asked them to make clear that such a test is provocative and this plan should be discontinued.”

The North has said the rocket’s trajectory will be southwards and that will not impact neighboring countries.

North Korea wants to use the celebrations around Kim Il-sung’s birthday on April 15 to showcase its emergence as a “strong and prosperous nation”, even as millions go hungry and it begs for international aid.

Its vow to fire a rocket carrying a working satellite has put in jeopardy a deal struck in February with the United States to get food aid in return for a moratorium on long-range missile and nuclear tests.

The North’s Foreign Ministry warned that it was “intolerable double standards” for some countries to assert that the North was the only nation not allowed to launch satellites while for the same countries, satellite launches were commonplace.

“If there will be any sinister attempt to deprive the (North) of its independent and legitimate right and put the unreasonable double standards upon it, this will inevitably compel the (North) to take countermeasures,” the ministry said in a statement late on Friday.

PHILIPPINES ON ALERT

An Australian foreign ministry official told Reuters Canberra has expressed concern about the flight path which “suggest a southerly trajectory for the missile, with booster rockets landing in the Yellow Sea and off the coast of the Philippines”.

Philippine Defence Secretary Voltaire Gazmin said this week the North’s launch was “unacceptable”, and that it was relying on U.S. help to track it. Indonesia has also condemned it.

North Korea has conducted two similar launches. The last one, in 2009, provoked outrage in Tokyo because the rocket flew over Japan. As it did three years ago, Japan says it is prepared to shoot the rocket down if it threatens its territory.

The rocket launch, which the United States and other countries say is the same as a ballistic missile test, is banned under U.N. resolutions.

Even China, North Korea’s main ally, has expressed its worry over the launch, scheduled for between April 12 and April 16, and has urged the North to “stay calm and exercise restraint and avoid escalation”.

The secretive North has twice tested a nuclear device, but experts doubt whether it yet has the ability to miniaturize an atomic bomb to fit inside a warhead.

The North’s rocket launch is expected to be one of main issues up for discussion when about 50 world leaders gather in Seoul on Monday for Nuclear Security Summit. Among those attending are China’s president, Hu Jintao, and U.S. President Barack Obama.

(Additonal reporting by Manila, Canberra and Jakarta bureaus; Editing by Jack Kim and Robert Birsel)

Foreign Minister Kim Sung-hwan told Reuters that while nuclear weapons and proliferation issues were not on the formal agenda at the Nuclear Security Summit in Seoul from Monday, Iran and North Korea would clearly be key issues on the sidelines.

“There is no question that international community has serious concerns about the illegitimate nuclear activities of North Korea and Iran,” he said in a written interview.

“As major leaders including leaders of the participating countries in the six-party talks will attend the Seoul summit, the North Korean nuclear issue will naturally be discussed on the separate occasions such bilateral talks on the margins of the summit,” he said, adding dozens of such meetings had been planned.

Along with South Korean host President Lee Myung-bak, leaders from four other six party states — U.S. President Barack Obama, China’s Hu Jintao, Russia’s Dmitry Medvedev and Japan’s Yoshihiko Noda — will be in Seoul for the two-day summit.

North Korea will not attend the summit and its pursuit of nuclear program and ballistic missile program had not been on the formal agenda, but the announcement of a long-range rocket launch in April is now expected to take centre stage.

North Korea will consider it a “provocation” if its “nuclear issue is placed on the agenda at the Seoul summit” and if any statement is issued against the North for pursuing such a program, its official KCNA news agency said.

“Any provocation will amount to a declaration of war against the DPRK (North Korea) and result in throwing a stumbling block in the way of discussing the denuclearization of the peninsula,” it said on Wednesday.

MISSILE TEST

Lee is expected to urge China’s Hu to use his influence with North Korea to stop the planned rocket launch, which it says will put a satellite into orbit to mark the birth centenary of the state’s founder Kim Il-sung.

Experts say the launch is clearly a ballistic missile test, banned by U.N. resolutions and it would likely undermine an agreement last month between Pyongyang and Washington to suspend such testing to foster talks on resuming U.S. food aid.

China has already put rare public pressure on the North over the reclusive state’s plan to launch the rocket, which cast fresh doubts on talks aimed at ending its nuclear ambitions in return for economic aid and diplomatic rewards.

The announcement last week of the rocket launch caused outrage among international powers which pressed the North to call off the move saying it would deepen tension and further isolate it.

The North has twice tested a nuclear device, but experts doubt whether it has the ability to miniaturize an atomic bomb to place it atop a warhead.

North Korea is believed to have enough fissile material to make up to a dozen nuclear bombs, and in 2010 unveiled a uranium enrichment facility, in addition to its plutonium program, which opened a second route to making an atomic weapon.

Kim said South Korea had shared its concern with six-party members about the rocket launch, and would try to dissuade the North from following through with its plan.

(Editing by Robert Birsel)

Seoul also extended a security alert in the capital, and said it was concerned the North might follow the ballistic missile launch with another nuclear test.

The North announced on Friday it would put a satellite into orbit next month barely two weeks after reaching an agreement with Washington to suspend long-range missile launches as part of a deal to restart food aid.

“Our government defines North Korea’s so-called working satellite launch plan as a grave provocation to develop a long-distance delivery means for nuclear weapons by using ballistic missile technology,” presidential spokesman Park Jung-ha said in a statement.

Washington says the North’s long-range ballistic missile program is progressing quickly, and last year said the American mainland could come under threat within five years.

The secretive North has twice tested a nuclear device, but experts doubt whether it yet has the ability to miniaturize an atomic bomb to place atop a warhead.

Pyongyang is believed to have enough fissile material to make up to a dozen nuclear bombs, and in 2010 unveiled a uranium enrichment facility to go with its plutonium program which opened a second route to making an atomic weapon.

On Monday, President Lee Myung-bak met the foreign and security-related ministers to discuss the North’s surprise announcement, which also flies in the face of a U.N. Security Council resolution banning long-range missile launches.

Park said in a statement that Seoul would work closely with the United States, Japan, China and Russia – all members of the six-party forum which deals with the North’s nuclear program – during next week’s Nuclear Security Summit in Seoul.

North Korea’s weapons of mass destruction program is not on the agenda for the summit, but will be one of the major talking points on the sidelines of the meeting involving some 50 world leaders including Barack Obama and Hu Jintao.

SEOUL DEFENCE ALERT

The South’s defense ministry said it had established a team to monitor the rocket launch and would maintain a heightened defense alert for the Security Summit in Seoul through to the rocket launch, scheduled for between April 12 and 16.

Ministry spokesman Yoon Won-shik told reporters that Seoul and Washington would use “surveillance assets” to watch the missile base in Tongchang-ri and follow the flight path after it is launched.

The North says the flight will not impact neighbors.

Yoon said authorities were also on alert in case the North follows up the rocket launch with a nuclear test, as it did in 2009.

Ties between the two Koreas, which are still technically at war, having only signed an armistice to end the 1950-53 Korean War, have hit their lowest level for decades since conservative Lee Myung-bak won the presidency in 2008.

Political analysts say the launch is aimed at boosting the legitimacy of the North’s young new ruler, Kim Jong-un, who inherited power after his father’s death in December.

The North on Sunday defended the launch, saying, “The peaceful development and use of space is a universally recognized legitimate right of a sovereign state.”

Pyongyang says it is using the rocket to launch a satellite to mark the 100th anniversary of the birth of Kim Il-sung, the country’s founding ruler and grandfather of the current ruler.

INTERNATIONAL CONCERN

The launch threatens to derail a food aid deal the North struck with Washington last month. Then, Pyongyang agreed to suspend nuclear tests, missile launches and uranium enrichment and to allow nuclear inspectors into the country.

More troubling, perhaps, for Pyongyang, which is long accustomed to trading invective with Washington, China has called the planned launch a “worry” in a rare attempt to put public pressure on its impoverished ally.

Japan would do its best to prevent any damage from a launch, the country’s defense minister said.

“Depending on the situation, we would consider deploying PAC3 missile interceptors and Aegis ships,” Naoki Tanaka told lawmakers in the upper house of parliament, according to broadcaster NHK.

“Considering what happened in 2009, we are prepared to do our utmost to prevent any damage to Okinawa and the rest of the country,” he said, in reply to a query from an Okinawa lawmaker.

In April 2009, North Korea conducted a ballistic rocket launch that resulted in a new round of U.N. sanctions, squeezing the secretive state’s already troubled economy and deepening its isolation.

That launch was dismissed as a failure after the first stage fell into the Sea of Japan without placing a satellite in orbit. Another test failed in similar circumstances in 1998.

(Additional reporting by Jack Kim in Seoul and Stanley White in Tokyo; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said the announcement was highly provocative and called upon Pyongyang to honor its obligations including U.N. Security Council resolutions banning ballistic missile launches.

“Such a missile launch would pose a threat to regional security and would also be inconsistent with North Korea’s recent undertaking to refrain from long-range missile launches,” she said in a statement.

The North, which said recently it would suspend long-range missile testing as part of talks with the United States, pledged that next month’s launch would not impact neighboring countries.

Experts said the launch was clearly another long-range missile test, and could be seen as an act of brinkmanship to pressure Washington into more talks in return for aid.

South Korea, which is still technically at war with the North after signing only an armistice to end the 1950-53 Korean War, and Japan said the ballistic launch threatened regional security.

Any launch by North Korea, whether for a satellite or not, that uses ballistic missile technology violates Security Council resolutions, the Japanese government said.

“We urge North Korea to exercise restraint and refrain from the launch,” said the top government spokesman, Chief Cabinet Secretary Osamu Fujimura.

China, the reclusive state’s only main ally, was more restrained in its response, but stressed on maintaining peace on the divided peninsula.

“Protecting the peace and stability of the Korean Peninsula and North East Asia suits the joint interests of all parties and is the consistent expectation of the international community. This requires that all relevant parties take a constructive role,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Weimin told reporters at a regular news briefing.

MISSILE ADVANCES

In April 2009, the North conducted a similar ballistic rocket launch which resulted in a new round of toughened U.N. sanctions, squeezing the secretive state’s already troubled economy and deepening its isolation.

That launch, dismissed as a failure after the first stage fell into the Sea of Japan without orbiting a satellite, provoked outrage in Tokyo which had threatened to shoot down any debris or rocket that threatened its territory.

Another test failed in similar circumstances in 1998.

Washington says the North’s long-range ballistic missile program is moving ahead quickly and former Defense Secretary Robert Gates said last year that the American mainland could come under threat within five years.

“The DPRK is to launch a working satellite, Kwangmyongsong-3, manufactured by itself with indigenous technology to mark the 100th birth anniversary of President Kim Il-sung,” the North’s official KCNA said, quoting a spokesman for the Korean Committee for Space Technology.

The launch will take place between April 12-16, KCNA said. It is scheduled to occur at around the same time its foes in the South hold a parliamentary election, and just over three weeks after a global nuclear security summit in Seoul.

CELEBRATIONS, MILITARISTIC IMAGE

Pyongyang has been planning massive celebrations for years to mark Kim Il-sung’s birthday on April 15, and has boasted the occasion would also mark its emergence on the international stage as a “strong and prosperous” nation.

Analysts said the launch was designed to boost the country’s new leadership and to pressure Washington into making concessions.

“For the outside world this is the same as a long-range missile test,” said Park Young-ho of the Korea Institute for National Unification, a government affiliated think tank.

“This can interpreted as a means of applying pressure on the Americans in negotiations, and is a celebration of the founder’s birth as well as an opportunity for the new leadership to celebrate the beginning of a new era,” Park said in Seoul.

The state’s new young leader Kim Jong-un, who became the third member of the Kim family to lead the state after his father Kim Jong-il’s death in December, has presented a militaristic image to his countrymen since taking power.

He has visited several military sites and been seen mixing with top brass in what analysts say is a move designed to win the all-powerful army’s backing for the succession process.

KCNA said the launch would be conducted from a base near its border with China, indicating it would take place at a newly constructed missile testing site believed to be larger and more advanced than the site used to launch previous rockets.

The launch will be made southwards and debris generated from the flight will not impact neighboring countries, it said.

(Additional reporting by Jumin Park in Seoul and Kiyoshi Takenaka in Tokyo; Editing by Sanjeev Miglani)

In April 2009, a long-range missile test failed when its first stage fell into the Sea of Japan without orbiting a satellite, provoking outrage in Tokyo, which had threatened to shoot down any debris or rocket that threatened its territory.

Another test failed in similar circumstances in 1998.

Experts said the latest launch was clearly another long-range missile test, designed to pressure Washington into advancing stalled nuclear disarmament negotiations.

The North, which said recently it would suspend long-range missile testing as part of talks with the United States, said on Friday it had already launched two experimental satellites.

Japan’s Foreign Ministry said the new launch would be a violation of a U.N. Security Council resolution, according to Jiji news service. There was no immediate comment from officials in Seoul about the latest rocket launch.

Foreign officials have also said the secretive state’s past launches are disguised long-range missile tests. The North said it would be a satellite launched southwards from a base near its west coast and would have no impact on neighbouring countries, saying the launch was for “peaceful purposes”.

“The DPRK is to launch a working satellite, Kwangmyongsong-3, manufactured by itself with indigenous technology to mark the 100th birth anniversary of President Kim Il-sung,” the North’s official KCNA said, quoting a spokesman for the Korean Committee for Space Technology.

The launch will take place between April 12-16, KCNA said. It is scheduled to occur at around the same time its foes in the South hold a parliamentary election, and just over three weeks after a global nuclear security summit in Seoul.

CELEBRATIONS, MILITARISTIC IMAGE

Pyongyang has been planning massive celebrations for years to mark Kim Il-sung’s birthday on April 15, and has boasted the occasion would also mark its emergence on the international stage as a “strong and prosperous” nation.

Analysts gave a different interpretation of the launch.

“For the outside world this is the same as a long-range missile test,” said Park Young-ho of the Korea Institute for National Unification, a government affiliated think tank.

“This can interpreted as a means of applying pressure on the Americans in negotiations, and is a celebration of the founder’s birth as well as an opportunity for the new leadership to celebrate the beginning of a new era,” Park said in Seoul.

The state’s new young leader Kim Jong-un, who became the third member of the Kim family to lead the state after his father Kim Jong-il’s death in December, has presented a militaristic image to his countrymen since taking power.

He has visited several military sites and been seen mixing with top brass in what analysts say is a move designed to win the all-powerful army’s backing for the succession process.

KCNA said the launch would be conducted from a base near its border with China, indicating it would take place at a newly constructed missile testing site believed to be larger and more advanced than the site used to launch previous rockets.

North Korea has used the name “Kwangmyongsong” to refer to what is called outside the reclusive country the “Taepodong” long-range missiles which were tested in 1998, 2006 and in 2009.

The North Korean spokesman said the launch would “offer an important occasion of putting the country’s technology of space use for peaceful purposes on a higher stage”.

In the 2009 launch, the North insisted the satellite made it into orbit and played revolutionary communist songs, despite officials in the United States and South Korea saying there were no indications of a satellite reaching space.

North Korea has agreed to a moratorium on long-range missile and nuclear tests in discussions with Washington to try to resume stalled nuclear disarmament talks and win U.S. food aid. Further talks have yet to be planned.

North Korea has been developing the so-called Taepodong-2 missile with an estimated range of more than 6,000 km (3,725 miles) but was previously seen as a long way off producing a functioning means of delivering weapons of mass destruction.

The North’s arsenal already includes intermediate-range missiles that can hit targets up to 3,000 km (i,865 miles) away, officials say, putting all of Japan and U.S. military bases in Guam at risk.

The U.N. Security Council adopted tough sanctions against Pyongyang in 2009 after its last rocket launch, squeezing its already troubled economy and deepening the North’s isolation after the six-party disarmament talks collapsed.

The North conducted a second nuclear test around its 2009 missile launch.

(Additional reporting by Jumin Park; Editing by Paul Tait)