President Obama called for North Korea to be punished after the isolated communist state fired an intercontinental rocket today, defying weeks of warnings from world leaders and provoking anxiety across north-east Asia.

The UN Security Council will meet in emergency session in New York this afternoon after a demand for action from governments across the world, including the US, Britain, France and above all Japan, over whose territory the rocket flew. It is unlikely that Russia and China will agree to new sanctions because the projectile appears to have been the vehicle for a satellite, rather than an intercontinental ballistic missile.

"This provocation underscores the need for action, not just this afternoon at the UN Security Council, but in our determination to prevent the spread of these weapons,” Mr Obama said in a speech in the Czech capital, Prague, calling for efforts towards nuclear disarmament.

“Rules must be binding, violations must be punished, words must mean something. The world must stand together to prevent the spread of these weapons. Now is the time for a strong international response.”

Expert View

Despite all the huffing and puffing, there isn’t much that outraged governments can actually do

Richard Lloyd Parry, Asia Editor

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The three stage rocket, known as a Taepodong 2, was fired at around 11.20am from the Musudan-ri launch site in the north east of North Korea. According to the North Korean state media, it successfully placed a communications satellite into orbit about ten minutes later, and safely cleared northern Japan where batteries of Patriot missile interceptors were on standby in case of a misfiring.

North Korea claims that the satellite is presently broadcasting songs in praise of its supreme leader Kim Jong Il, and his late father, Kim Il Sung. It said that the Kwangmyongsong 2, or Lodestar, was orbiting between 490 kilometres (306 miles) and 1,426 km from earth in a cycle lasting 104 minutes.

“It is sending to the earth the melodies of the immortal revolutionary paeans Song of General Kim Il Sung and Song of General Kim Jong Il,” the Korean Central News Agency said. “The carrier rocket and the satellite developed by the indigenous wisdom and technology are the shining results gained in the efforts to develop the nation's space science and technology on a higher level.”

But the US military reported that the rocket’s payload failed to enter orbit and fell into the sea. “Stage one of the missile fell into the Sea of Japan,” said a statement by the North American Aerospace Defence Command and US Northern Command. “The remaining stages along with the payload itself landed in the Pacific Ocean. No object entered orbit and no debris fell on Japan.”

Foreign governments say that even a satellite launch would allow the North Koreans to improve rocket technology which, by its nature, can be readily adapted to military use. China and Russia called for calm and restraint, but reaction elsewhere was stern.

“This government and the international community is deeply disappointed that the North went ahead with the long-range missile at the enormous cost that could resolve its chronic food shortage,” the South Korean foreign minister, Yu Myung Hwan, said. “The government is stepping up readiness in response to any provocation by the North and is taking specific actions against this launch together with the United Nations and related countries.”

The Japanese prime minister, Taro Aso, said: “It is an extremely provocative action. Japan can never overlook it.”

The launch had been expected on Saturday after satellite images revealed that the rocket had been fuelled last week, and Japan was on alert after the country’s armed forces raised two false alarms that the missile had been fired.

The launch of the rocket seems to have been timed to coincide with the weekend of the Nato summit in Strasbourg. It also serves as a salute to North Korea’s newly elected puppet parliament, the Supreme People’s Assembly, which convenes its new session on Thursday.

If the satellite did indeed fall into the sea then it represents only a partial triumph for the government of Pyongyang. Both previous attempts to launch the Taepodong ended in failure: in 1998, an earlier satellite failed to enter orbit and in 2006 the missile exploded less than a minute after its launch.

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