North Korea has threatened to "destroy" US spy satellites if Washington tries to "attack" its space asset after Pyongyang launched its first military eye into the sky last week.
A spokesman for North Korea's Defense Ministry said it would consider such a move a "declaration of war," according to a statement carried by the state-run Korean Central News Agency.
The statement came after a US official remarked that Washington "can deprive the adversary of space and counterspace capabilities...using a variety of reversible and irreversible means", referring to the North's successful launch of a spy satellite in late November.
The U.S. military can undermine "the effectiveness and lethality of adversary forces in all domains," Cheryl Klinkel, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Space Command, told Radio Free Asia this week.
Successive rounds of UN resolutions have banned North Korea from conducting tests using ballistic technology, and analysts say there is significant technological overlap between space launch capabilities and ballistic missile development.
Putting a working intelligence satellite into orbit would improve North Korea's intelligence-gathering capabilities, particularly over South Korea, and provide vital data in the event of a military conflict, experts say.
After last week's launch, the North claimed its satellite had already provided images of key US and South Korean military sites.
It has yet to release any of the satellite images it claims to have.
The launch of Maligyon-1 from the North was Pyongyang's third attempt to put such a satellite into orbit after two previous failures. /BGNES
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