North Korea's Rocket Launch Fails

WORLD -- April 12, 2012 at 8:31 PM EDT

North Korea's Rocket Launch Fails

Foreign journalists were allowed inside North Korea's satellite control and command center in Pyongyang on Wednesday.

North Korea's long-range ballistic missile broke apart minutes after its launch early Friday, according to the Associated Press. The rocket apparently flew 75 miles before it broke into four pieces and crashed into the sea, off the coast of the Korean peninsula.

News broke around 6:53 p.m. ET Thursday that the rocket, fueled at the launch site in Pyongyang on the country's western coast, had failed -- issuing a severe blow to one of the world's most secretive and belligerent regimes.

On Wednesday's NewsHour, John Isaacs of the Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation told Judy Woodruff that North's Korea's new missile was "sophisticated."

"If they can get it to work, it's sophisticated, I think, by definition," he said. "If it could carry a warhead thousands of kilometers, it would be very sophisticated, but that's not easy to do."

Watch Friday's NewsHour and visit the World page for more coverage on North Korea and its failed missile launch.

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