DPRK to hold parliamentary session as satellite launch enters 'full-fledged' stage

The Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) will convene a parliamentary session in April, the official KCNA news agency reported Saturday.

The Fifth Session of the 12th Supreme People's Assembly (SPA) of the DPRK will be held on April 13, and representatives of the SPA should be registered on April 11-12, said the KCNA in a brief dispatch, without elaborating its agenda.

The SPA is the supreme power organ of the DPRK, which holds the highest position and authority of the country and exercises legislative power.

The announcement came as the country's preparations for a satellite launch "have entered a full-fledged stage of action," a spokesman for the DPRK's foreign ministry said Friday.

According to the KCNA, the projected launch of the Satellite Kwangmyongsong-3 is to mark the centenary of the birth of late President Kim Il Sung, and it is a worldwide trend to launch and use satellites needed for a country's economic development.

The spokesman said peaceful satellite launching is an exercise of "an independent and legitimate right" for all countries.

The DPRK's satellite launch is "an issue fundamentally different from the Feb. 29 DPRK-U.S. Agreement," as the DPRK has consistently clarified that "the satellite launch is not included in the long-range missile launch" covered by the DPRK-U.S. high-level talks, the spokesman added.