S. Korea on high alert over further N. Korean provocations

SEOUL, Feb. 8 (Yonhap) -- South Korea's presidential office said Monday it is on high alert for any signs of additional provocations by North Korea in the wake of the country's long-range rocket launch a day earlier.

North Korea fired a long-range rocket carrying what it called an Earth observation satellite Sunday, a move that Seoul and Washington view as a cover for testing an intercontinental ballistic missile.

Cheong Wa Dae said that President Park Geun-hye will be briefed by her aides on signs of additional provocations by North Korea though she has no official schedule on Lunar New Year's Day.

Park will also check the South Korean military's readiness to counter any provocation by the North, it said.

"Security of South Korea and its people is exposed to threats as nobody knows how North Korea will make reckless provocations," Park said Sunday at a meeting of the National Security Council.

In response to the North's rocket launch, South Korea and the United States announced Sunday that they've agreed to begin talks over the "earliest possible" deployment of an advanced U.S. missile defense system, named the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense, on South Korean soil.

The government also said it will expand its psychological warfare of anti-North Korean loudspeaker broadcasts, a tactic that irritates North Korea. Seoul has resumed its loudspeaker campaign since the North conducted its fourth nuclear test on Jan. 6.

Later in the day, a parliamentary committee on foreign affairs plans to hold a meeting to discuss how to respond to North Korea's long-range missile launch.

Lawmakers are widely expected to review a resolution condemning North Korea's rocket launch and its nuke test, it said.

sooyeon@yna.co.kr
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