An international think-tank cautioned that any international over-reaction to the launch set for April 4-8 could wreck nuclear disarmament talks and even spark a war.

Pyongyang says no one has the right to impede its launch of a communications satellite as part of a peaceful space programme.

The United States, South Korea and Japan say the launch is a pretext for a "provocative" test of a long-range ballistic missile.

That would violate UN resolutions, and they have said they will report the launch to the Security Council.

The North's Korean Central Broadcasting Station denounced US aircraft for monitoring the preparations.

"Should the US imperialist racketeers dare to intrude espionage planes into our territorial sky, interfering with our preparations for a satellite launch for peaceful purposes, our revolutionary forces will shoot them down unsparingly," it said.

The communist state's official media said Tuesday that US and South Korean planes had conducted "intensive" espionage every day from March 9 to 20, including over the launch site at Musudan-ri on the northeast coast.

The ruling party newspaper Rodong Sinmun took aim at US moves for a missile defence system, saying it would spark a global arms race.

The North's missile threat is "non-existent," the paper said. "The US is posing a missile threat to the (North) and the latter is its victim."

South Korea's nuclear envoy Wi Sung-Lac said the distinction between a satellite test and a missile launch is immaterial.

"(The North's) weapons of mass destruction combined with its ability to deliver something at long range is a problem, regardless of what is mounted on the top of the rocket," he said on his return from talks in Washington with his US and Japanese counterparts.

Wi told reporters there would be a response to a launch from the Security Council "but it is too early to say at what level it will be."

The International Crisis Group (ICG) said the prospective launch "fits a pattern of North Korean attention-seeking when faced with stresses at home, political changes abroad or failure to get what it wants in negotiations."

But the influential Brussels-based conflict resolution body said an "overblown" international response could scupper six-party nuclear disarmament talks and strengthen hardliners in Pyongyang.

Any use of missile defences against the rocket could in the worst case "risk a war with potentially devastating damage to South Korea, Japan and the world economy," it said in a report.

Japan has deployed anti-missile systems to try to bring down the rocket should it start falling toward Japanese territory, but the United States says it does not intend to try an intercept.

The North says even a Security Council debate on the launch would wreck the six-party talks and any interception would mean war.

The ICG said the Taepodong-2 missile does not pose a significantly increased risk to Japan, since the North's shorter-range Rodong missile can already carry a nuclear warhead as far as Tokyo.

The report quoted intelligence sources as saying such warheads are believed to have been assembled for the Rodong.

"The Taepodong-2 could possibly reach Alaska but the likelihood of such a strike is negligible, since the North knows it would be devastated in any response," it said.

"The launch of a Taepodong-2 also takes weeks to prepare; in a time of considerable tensions the missile could be destroyed on the (launch) pad."

Amid rising tensions, tight security was in force for North Korea's visiting football squad, which was to play South Korea later Wednesday in Seoul in a World Cup qualifier.

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