World Briefs: Pyongyang mulls delay for rocket launch

A North Korean agency has announced it is considering delaying a long-range rocket launch this month that would commemorate the first anniversary of the death of longtime leader Kim Jong-il and violate international law.

A spokesman for the Korean Committee of Space Technology gave no reason for potentially delaying the rocket launch, the communist state’s second attempt in eight months. A launch in April ended with the rocket breaking apart over the Pacific.

“Our scientists and technicians, however, are now seriously examining the issue of readjusting the launching time of the satellite for some reasons,” the spokesman told the state-run Korean Central News Agency on Saturday.

North Korea announced earlier this month it had scheduled the launch between Dec. 10 and Dec. 22. Kim died Dec. 17.

The announcement came after U.S. and other international officials — including those from China, North Korea’s only regional ally — asked North Korean officials not to proceed with the launch.

Western nations have said what North Korea claims are satellite launches are actually ballistic-missile tests, since the same technology applies. The U.N. has banned North Korea from conducting such tests.

PAKISTAN

U.S. drone strike kills senior al Qaeda leader

PESHAWAR — A U.S. drone strike has killed a senior al Qaeda leader in Pakistan’s tribal region near the Afghan border, Pakistani intelligence officials said, in the latest blow to the Islamic militant network.

Sheik Khalid bin Abdel Rehman al-Hussainan, who was also known as Abu Zaid al-Kuwaiti, was killed when missiles slammed into a house Thursday near Mir Ali, one of the main towns in the North Waziristan tribal area, the officials said.

Al-Kuwaiti appeared in many videos released by al Qaeda’s media wing, Al-Sahab, and was presented as a religious scholar for the group.

Earlier this year, he replaced Abu Yahya al-Libi, al Qaeda’s second-in-command, who was killed in a U.S. drone strike in North Waziristan in June, the intelligence officials said.

Al-Libi was a key Islamic religious figure within al Qaeda and also a prominent militant commander.

Al-Kuwaiti appeared to be a less prominent figure and was not part of the State Department’s list of most-wanted terrorist suspects, as al-Libi had been.

PHILIPPINES

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