North Korea has completed installing a long-range rocket on its launch pad, ahead of its planned launch this month in defiance of widespread international condemnation, a report said on Wednesday.
All three stages of the Unha-3 rocket have been placed on the pad at the North’s Sohae satellite launch station, a South Korean government source told Yonhap news agency.
“Some workers are pulling out of the site,” the source said.
Pyongyang announced on Saturday that it intends to launch the rocket between December 10 and 22.
The United States and its key Asian allies South Korea and Japan have condemned the move as a disguised ballistic missile test that violates UN resolutions triggered by Pyongyang’s two nuclear tests in 2006 and 2009.
North Korea is now expected to install support equipment, such as radar and cameras, before fuelling the carrier, Yonhap said.
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Tuesday urged her Nato allies and Russia to press North Korea to call off the mission.
