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| North Korea Claims Rockets Were Unrelated to Pope’s Trip | North Korea Claims Rockets Were Unrelated to Pope’s Trip |
| (10 days later) | |
| SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea said Friday that the rockets it launched the previous day had not been meant to coincide with the start of Pope Francis’ five-day visit to its rival, South Korea. | |
| “We don’t know and in fact have no interest at all in why he is traveling to South Korea and what he is going to plot with the South Korean puppets,” Pyongyang’s official Korean Central News Agency quoted Kim In-yong, a North Korean rocket scientist, as saying in reference to the pope. | “We don’t know and in fact have no interest at all in why he is traveling to South Korea and what he is going to plot with the South Korean puppets,” Pyongyang’s official Korean Central News Agency quoted Kim In-yong, a North Korean rocket scientist, as saying in reference to the pope. |
| The real question, the report quoted Mr. Kim as saying, was: “Why of all the days of the year, as numerous as the hairs of a cow, did the pope choose to come to the South on the very day we had planned to test our rockets?” | The real question, the report quoted Mr. Kim as saying, was: “Why of all the days of the year, as numerous as the hairs of a cow, did the pope choose to come to the South on the very day we had planned to test our rockets?” |
| North Korea fired three short-range rockets off its east coast shortly before Pope Francis’ plane landed at an airport south of Seoul on Thursday morning, and it launched two more later in the day. The secretive country has conducted numerous such launches in recent months, but the timing Thursday led to speculation that it was meant to send a signal as the pontiff’s high-profile trip began. | North Korea fired three short-range rockets off its east coast shortly before Pope Francis’ plane landed at an airport south of Seoul on Thursday morning, and it launched two more later in the day. The secretive country has conducted numerous such launches in recent months, but the timing Thursday led to speculation that it was meant to send a signal as the pontiff’s high-profile trip began. |
| Mr. Kim was quoted as calling such an idea “absurd,” saying that such tests were conducted under predetermined schedules. | Mr. Kim was quoted as calling such an idea “absurd,” saying that such tests were conducted under predetermined schedules. |
| In a speech Thursday welcoming the pope, South Korea’s president, Park Geun-hye, had mentioned North Korea’s persecution of Christians and reiterated her demand that the North give up its nuclear weapons program. | In a speech Thursday welcoming the pope, South Korea’s president, Park Geun-hye, had mentioned North Korea’s persecution of Christians and reiterated her demand that the North give up its nuclear weapons program. |
| The pope’s South Korea trip continued Friday with a Mass conducted before tens of thousands of people in the city of Daejeon, part of Asian Youth Day, a gathering of young Catholics. He also met with survivors of the ferry sinking that killed more than 300 South Koreans in April and with people who had lost family members in the disaster. | The pope’s South Korea trip continued Friday with a Mass conducted before tens of thousands of people in the city of Daejeon, part of Asian Youth Day, a gathering of young Catholics. He also met with survivors of the ferry sinking that killed more than 300 South Koreans in April and with people who had lost family members in the disaster. |