State media said that North Korea conducted "another major test" in the creation of a spy satellite on Sunday, but observers cautioned that it was a thinly veiled ballistic missile launch only days before South Korea elects a new president.
Pyongyang test-fired a slew of banned weapons in January, including hypersonic and medium-range ballistic missiles, and last week launched what it claimed was a component of a "reconnaissance satellite" — though Seoul identified it as yet another ballistic missile.
Although North Korea is subject to harsh international sanctions for its nuclear weapons development, harmless satellite launches are not, despite the fact that they utilise much of the same technology.
Pyongyang's primary defence programmes, as detailed by leader Kim Jong Un last year, include the creation of a military reconnaissance satellite, as well as the testing of hypersonic missiles in January.
"On Saturday, the DPRK National Aerospace Development Administration (NADA) and the Academy of Defence Science conducted another major test under the plan of creating a reconnaissance satellite," the KCNA news agency reported, using the North's official acronyms.
"Through the test, the NADA confirmed the reliability of the satellite's data transmission and receiving system, its control command system, and other ground-based control systems," the statement continued.
South Korea claimed on Saturday that the test, which occurred just days before the country's presidential election on Wednesday, was a ballistic missile launch.
Pyongyang has stepped up its efforts to modernise its military, dismissing US offers of discussions and threatening to end a self-imposed moratorium on long-range missiles and nuclear weapons testing.
"Because satellites and ICBMs are identical on the inside and out, a satellite launch will return the Korean peninsula to the height of tensions seen in 2017," Yang Moo-jin, a professor at Seoul's University of North Korean Studies, warned.
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