Unha-3 and Resolution 2087 — Dec 2012 — Satellize
Dec 2012 · United Nations · DPRK

Unha-3 and Resolution 2087

North Korea's Unha-3 successfully orbits Kwangmyongsong-3-2. The Security Council, in Resolution 2087, expands sanctions to cover almost any space-relevant import to Pyongyang.

Unha-3 rocket on the pad at Sohae, North KoreaWikimedia Commons / Unha
What happened

A working catalogue entry, kept current. Each paragraph is drawn from the publicly documented record.

On 12 December 2012 North Korea's Unha-3 launcher places Kwangmyongsong-3-2 into orbit — Pyongyang's first verifiable orbital insertion. The launch is condemned in Tokyo, Seoul, Washington and Beijing simultaneously, an unusual unanimity that is itself a measure of how seriously the technical achievement is taken.

The UN Security Council, in Resolution 2087 (January 2013), expands sanctions to cover almost any space-relevant import to Pyongyang and triggers a fresh wave of secondary sanctions on intermediaries in third countries. The international architecture for restricting a sanctioned state's civilian space programme is, by this point, mature.

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