North Korea may test-launch ICBM soon - South Korean media

Seoul: North Korea may be preparing to test-launch a new, upgraded prototype of an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), South Korean media reported on Thursday, citing military sources.

In his New Year`s speech, leader Kim Jong Un said North Korea was close to test launching an ICBM, and state media has said a launch could come at any time. Experts on the isolated and nuclear capable country`s missile programme believe the claims to be credible. 

That test launch could be imminent, and potentially coincide with the inauguration of U.S. President-elect Donald Trump on Friday, South Korean media said. 

South Korean intelligence agencies reported on Wednesday that they had recently spotted missile parts being transported, believed to be the lower-half of an ICBM, raising fears that a test-launch may be imminent, the Chosun Ilbo newspaper said, citing unidentified military sources.

"It was different from a conventional Musudan missile in its length and shape," the source told the Chosun Ilbo, referring to the Musudan intermediate-range missile tested by North Korea last year.

"It is possible they were moving it somewhere for assembly," the source said.

A spokesman for South Korea`s Office of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Roh Jae-cheon, told a regular news briefing that while the reports could not be confirmed, the military was monitoring North Korea`s ICBM development.

North Korea has in the past paraded mockups of a road-mobile missile believed to be an ICBM design dubbed the KN-08 by outside observers. It is also believed to have an upgraded version, the KN-14.

A road-mobile ICBM, which could be kept hidden or moving until fired, would make tracking and stopping a North Korean missile launch significantly more difficult.

The suspected ICBM is made up of two parts under 15 metres (49 feet) long and is shorter than the KN-08 and KN-14, the Yonhap News Agency said, citing unidentified military sources. 

"I don`t recognise the missiles from this description," said Joshua Pollack, editor of the U.S.-based Nonproliferation Review. "But as we saw in 2016, there`s certainly a variety of active missile programmes underway in North Korea".

"It`s also possible that they are simply conducting field exercises with no plans to launch, or the option to launch if decided," said Pollack.

Last year, North Korea conducted a test of an ICBM engine made up of a cluster of smaller rockets, indicating it was working on an ICBM design.

Separately, the Washington-based think tank 38 North said on Thursday that operations at North Korea`s Yongbyon nuclear facility may have restarted. North Korea is believed to be able to reprocess plutonium at Yongbyon used in its nuclear warheads.