Seoul, Oct 30 (IANS): A North Korean propaganda outlet on Saturday described South Korea's "half-success" launch of its first homegrown rocket as "a definite failure", saying the South has a long way to go before proving its launch capabilities.

Quoting what it claims to be "comments from South Korean and foreign experts", the Echo of Unification, the anti-Seoul propaganda outlet, reported that the ultimate goal of the rocket launch was to send the dummy satellite into the orbit, which Nuri, or the Korea Space Launch Vehicle II, failed to accomplish during last week's launch, reports Yonhap News Agency.

The Nuri rocket was successfully launched from the country's southwest coast on October 21, flying to a target altitude of 700 km.

But it failed to put its 1.5-tonne dummy satellite into orbit.

South Korea plans to conduct another launch of the Nuri space rocket next year.

It is the first time a North Korean media outlet has run a report on the Nuri rocket launch.

Citing another expert, the outlet said that "the technological skills of Nuri are still 10 to 20 years behind", and that the South has "a long way to go before it proves its launching ability and competitiveness".